Vietnam War Interview Forum

Guest

>1) What is your name, rank, and army division?

Dave Wright, Sergeant, 1st Division

>2) Were you drafted or did you join voluntarily?

I volunteered for the draft to keep my active duty time down to two years and to get it over with.

>3) What were your comrades like?

From every ethnic and xocial group, high school drop outs to college graduates.  

>4) What did you do during your "down-time", if you had any?

Most of our down time was spent in small fire bases carved out of the jungle,  There were no movies, no booze, no girls and no PX.  We could read/write letters home, play cards, listen to tunes on radio Vietnam, eat, sleep, smoke and joke, try to forget the last mission and prepare our minds to go out on the next.

>5) What significant memories do you have from the war?

I was in a combat infantry unit so most memories involve a great deal of violence and loss of friends.

>6) How did you feel about the war at the time you were drafted as compared to now?

I didn't want to fight in a war but I could see the logic of trying to stop the aggression of Communism that had been building for years during the Cold War.

I believe now that if the war hadn't happened in Vietnam it would have happened somewhere else.

>7) What should the younger generation learn from your experiences?

Wars are inevitable because they are a manifistation of what is in the hearts of mankind at a particular point in time.  There will always be those who will take what they want from others until they are stopped by force.  Some will stand up and fight for justice at some point and some will be ready to take advantage of both sides for personal gain.

War is a tool used to completely subdue an enemy.  Politics is used to find a compromise solution that a majority can accept.  Mixing the two gets real confusing.

If the Communists had attacked US soil, we would have stopped at nothing to win the war.  Fighting on someone else's soil is different than fighting on your own.

>8) How long were you in Vietnam?

365 long days.

>9) What was the transition from the battlefield to home like?

I'm still transitioning.  

>10) What were your feelings on the way to Vietnam?

We were all afraid of the unknowns, how would we react at critical moments, would we be cowards or heros, would we come home with injuried or in a body bag?  No one talked about these things, we tried to stay mocho and kept our conversation to safe areas.

>11) How did fighting in the war change you as a person?

I have a different perspective on life than "normal" people.  All the terror and death drove me to find a relationship with Jesus Christ that wouldn't have happened without the war.

>12) What were your duties during the war?

I was a point man for about ten months.  About every third day, I would lead the column through the jungle and ride paddies.

>Thank you for taking your time to answer these questions, I really appreciate it.