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SOFREP Radio

06:39 min | 1 year ago

"local veterans council" Discussed on SOFREP Radio

"Our chapter to vet my baumgart. Who by the way. I got to meet in person three weeks ago. Down at hp. He's eighty years old and he still he go. He walked seventy eight miles a day. Sharp sharp is attack even though when he was injured. A he had brain injury You know they removed part of his exceptional low and He's historic of course is very unique because he had some odd out of body experiences During the whole thing so it it It turned out to be a really a very amazing experience for me writing the book. And i'm delighted that i was able to put this book together mended wayne's as a tribute to the guys that as i said at the beginning of the show were really kind of my heroes and and i'm glad that i was able to do this. Yeah another interesting character in. The book was As you put it broke lied. He was the only They they treated him like african american but he really wasn't. He was like latin american. The military as african-american he had a whole different I guess experience because he was dealing with other things. Besides you know being a helicopter pilot numb yeah vibe. Romero was grew up as basic basically a puerto rican from the bronx and So like you say when when he gets into the army he's basically told in some some words that That i did use in the book because he insisted. But i'm not gonna use on your podcast but they pretty much just told him it you. You're europe a black guy whether you like it or not. And so he sort of adopted that and so he became a black guy and as we relate in the book there. There weren't lot of weren't a lot of blacks in a flight program for whatever reasons at the time and so that put him in in kind of a unique situation and we talk about the things that he experienced and He's he's a very interesting character is well. I just i love him to death and All these all the black guys that that that we talk about including broke line are clyde mirror. They all served with tremendous pride for the united states. I mean they. I think their attitude was Yeah i might. I might be black. May be different. You might treat me a little bit differently. But when the chips are down by god it doesn't matter who you are who i am I'm there we're on the same team and and i. I think that that was true. By and large in the aviation units. I don't really have much experience. Outside of that. But i think they maintained their their racial cohesion a lot. More than some of the ground units Where some of the tensions got a little bit higher towards the end. That's that's my understanding again. I don't have a lot of experience with that. Yeah and In dealing with these you're interviewing them obviously many years after the fact but they all seem through their words that they're all pretty humble guys. Yes an this is an. I've been asked this before about the difference between vietnam vets and say the previous generation. And i think that that's a really interesting distinction to make. Because i know just from social settings primarily a lot of world war two vets and they rightfully are very proud of what they did They will tell you about the things. They went through You know it's maybe not a marine. Who is unworkable canal or something. But by and large these guys will will tell you about their military experiences and to this day those that are still with us are are proud about it and rightfully so and they came back from overseas with a swagger to them And i think that's all good and that's right and they may be called the greatest generation but I i like well. My phrase for the vietnam generation is forgotten generation because they came home to a totally different experience and as we mentioned in Eddie hesters chapter when he comes back from vietnam He's seen some terrible things and we won't go into those details but he's walking through. Lax and a guy walks up and spits on him. And i don't think that was a unique experience and so as a result our vietnam vets is. They are a much more humble group. And i think that for years and years and years not only did they feel like that they they. They weren't welcome to talk about their experiences. They felt like if in to anybody. But maybe their deepest darkest confidence they they would get abused for bringing up their vietnam experiences and so they i think they hit them away. They tuck them away. And it's only now that the within the art. I don't know what would you say steve. Maybe the last ten years that we finally accepted them. We're finally starting to say welcome home or finally starting to say thank you for your service and we're saying we don't blame you no matter how we felt about the war We don't blame you. You did your you did your service to your country. And that's another thing that that i wanted to accomplish. When i set out riding mended wings was this is really my My homage to to these guys to this generation pilots. It's a way for me to introduce them to people who did understand what they went through. And that was one of the things i set out to do. So that So that everybody can start to have a better appreciation of just what they went through what. They sacrificed what their families sacrificed. Because there's some of that in the book as well and So the weekend turned out to be an on bet and tell that that. welcome home. good job you know. Thank you for your service. Yeah it's funny. You mentioned that. Cause i you know when i was living up north along the local veterans council and we had the vfw american legion guys..