Today, people who weren’t even born when the Vietnam war ended still bring up how hippie radicals reviled the returning vets, as if it were common historical knowledge, established fact and a practice widespread throughout America and adopted by the Left. No, the returning Vets DID NOT hide away in shame, they proudly wore their old fatigues to Vietnam Veterans Against the War meetings and to anti-war demonstrations. They were leading the demonstrators, not hiding from them in shame. I was there, I know.

I wrote about this in my memoirs, a quarter century ago, and I will repeat those words here…

There were a few other reservists and many Vietnam vets at USF, and opposition to the war was now pretty universal on campus, especially among them. A lot had changed since I was away, I had missed the pivotal year of 1968 when the sixties finally arrived in Florida. My own opinions about the conflict were changing; it now seemed fairly clear that we were in a war of attrition and that our South Vietnamese allies were not as ready to die as were our adversaries from the North. Perhaps what really swayed me against the conflict was not so much the opinions of my classmates as the strident meanness of the sunshine patriots. I never claimed to be a hero; I never fired a shot at the enemy and was never under fire myself during my brief stay in the war zone, but I resented having my courage and patriotism questioned by people who had never been there. I found myself arguing both sides of the issue, and even during my period of uncertainty and debate about our involvement, my anti-war friends and even strangers of that opinion never insulted me for my views, not even on my trip to visit Roger at Morningside Heights. I was never called a baby-killer, and I never knew anyone who was called a baby-killer, or anyone who knew someone who was called a baby-killer. I can’t speak for anyone but myself, but I suspect that the alleged insults leveled against servicemen and veterans by opponents of the war were mostly lies perpetrated by the war’s supporters. Self -righteous vindictiveness has always been an American trait.

All those baby-killer stories always seemed to happen somewhere else, to someone else. I was in a major college campus for three years in the middle of the 70s anti-war movement and I never saw any of it.

Because I am a military dependent (my father, a 23 year career Air Force doctor who served in ‘Nam), I can use USAA for banking and insurance. Whenever I talk to them, they say “thanks for your service,” and I have to tell them it wasn’t me, but my late father. He didn’t like the phrase either, but accepted it with a smile.