VETERANS DAY

To all my fellow veterans, past and present...THANK YOU and GOD BLESS!

Proud to have served - US Army - 1956 - 1965 - RANGER - AIRBORNE

http://www.djstephens.net/Memorial.html

NEVER FORGET!

Thank you, Don, for your service. Twenty years is a long time.

alice wrote:

Thank you, Don, for your service. Twenty years is a long time.

Thanks Alice, it was ten years, I miss typed...it was a long night!

Thank you. Still a long time.

Alice, You're Welcome. I am truly honored to have served. It was ten of the most memorable years of my life. The first five, the most traumatic and terrifying memories (some still give me nightmares) and the second five produced some of my fondest memories.

Where were the first five spent?

Two years of training, Basic, Advanced Infantry, Jump School, Pathfinder Training, Ranger School, Jungle Warfare School, Sniper Training: The traumatic part. Three tours Southeast Asia, the terrifying part.

You are a hero in my book!

In anyone's book!

The hero's are the people that gave it all and didn't come home or the ones that survived to come home and be forgotten and homeless.

11/11/2012

I wonder if anyone still puts out their flags ? Where I live I do and

one other gentleman who's a WW 2 vet , he's 96 yrs. old I salute

the following....

My Grandfather WW 1

My Father WW2

My Step-Father WW 2

My Uncle Korean War

and all the men and women who served in all wars including

Iraq and Afghanistan...God Bless All Of Them..

Cheers..Joe...

Dear Don,

You did not have to die to be a hero to me. I love the living hero. The hero who is stilll alive. They lived through hell and gave everything, too.. their life on a line, and by their courage, lived. There is not shame in living.

My best respect to you, my friend.

Love,

Betty

My respect to you Don. Anyone who has read your books can see how your experience is reflected in the story, the plot and the characters. Nothing fudged in the story line.

My service did not include battle in war. My war experience was as a civilian caught up in Lebanon's Civil war. The side of war many don't see or hear is the side of the civilians enduring hardship. I learned much from my friend, Hermann Frech when translating his book, "On the Way to Siberia". Survival is seldom related to ideology. Movies are about heroic acts and too often glorify war. Don's Halo books along with Dick Stodghill's book from the soldier's perspective does not glorify war. The more I learn about war, the more I'm against it. Talking and compromise are better than dropping bombs. Death is final. I would no longer risk my life for ideology. I will risk it in defense of my family, but not for any political reason.

Abe,

Thank you for your service. You signed the same blank check as I did which included if necessary, your life. God Bless, my friend.

For my brother on Veteran's Day, 2012


Commander Clarence William "Bill" Levingston, Jr, USN aka "Charlie Brown" & "Yellowtail,"
October 24, 1940 - December 23, 2010.

From mid-1968 until early summer 1969, my brother, Bill Levingston, was stationed at Cam Ranh Bay in South Vietnam. Pilot of a P3V attack aircraft, his mission, on one day during that year, was to fly over a target in North Vietnam at low range and deliver his "cargo." While at his primary target, his plane was hit several times. Knowing that he was losing fuel, he continued on to his secondary target before returning to base. By the time he got back, he had almost no fuel, and his control panel had stopped working. The base was fogged in. He brought his plane and crew safely to the ground in spite of flying completely blind, by following radioed directions from ground control. For his actions that day, he was awarded the Distinguished Flying Cross. During that year he was also awarded three air medals. He came home and left the Navy to fly for Continental Airlines. He briefly left Continental for a couple of years during the early 1970's to serve as base commander for the naval reserve unit at Gretna, Louisiana. He retired from Continental in 2001. The picture shown was taken just before his final flight with Continental.

We miss you, Bill

For my brother who served in Viet Nam and returned home in body, but not in mind.
For my two Uncles who were in World War II. My husband who did research at Fort Detrick, MD. I was with him for a year during the service and we had a wonderful time.

You brother was/is a hero, Ann. His service reminds me of Tom Trostler whose military service included flying during the Cuban Missle crisis and afterwards flew for American Airlines until his retirement.

Saving lives in my view is heroic. Saving the lives of crew members or members of a squad has more valor than how many of the enemy one has killed. When one sees the "enemy" through the eyes of the "enemy" we find that they many are just like us. They have loved ones and want to survive and return home. They are duty bound to follow orders. Killing in self-defense for survival does not make them evil. War is evil. Let's all work and support the peacemakers.

Yes, Abe, let's work toward that end. So far, we have not evolved to a point where we do not need warriors to protect us. The individuals who put their lives on the line for us, whether on city streets in our police forces or as soldiers in our Armed Forces always deserve our support. They do not get to choose their battles, but must go where they are sent by those who give them their orders. Their devotion to duty needs to be honored whether we, as individuals, agree with those orders or not.

Carol and I often compared Tom and Bill.

I, like others here have said, wish that she'd had a chance to tell Tom's story from her perspective.

I am sad about Carol's book also. She worked so hard on it for naught.
She really needed one person to help her. I wish she had gotten Shelagh.

I am off topic, so will remedy that by saying "Happy Veteran's Day" to all!