Last year we attended the 39th annual Ia Drang Valley Vets reunion in Washington DC with my uncle and his family. Meeting and talking with these Viet Nam Vets is an awesome experience. My cousin, Jim, who is a Marine captain joined us at that reunion as well as Capt. Jeff from the Air Force. The dress blues and shined shoes were impressive. It was hard to tell who was more excited - young soldiers meeting old soldiers or old soldiers meeting young ones.
Jim is now in Iraq (soon to be home in Feb.). He sent this message about running into Joe Galloway who writes for Knight Ridder and was reporting from Iraq recently. I thought I would paste Jim's letter on here today because Uncle Bob sent an article Joe had written from Iraq (you can find it at Knight Ridder). You can't find Jim's letter on the internet, and it makes a good story too:
Uncle Bob,
Figured you'd be thrilled to know that I ran into Joe Galloway this evening at the chowhall at Camp Fallujah. Definitely the highlight of my week!!! My 1stSgt looked across the chowhall and said, hey Sir, isn't that the reporter that knows General Moore! I spun around and there he was surrounded by his escorts...a bunch of motivated Marine NCOs. I said to 1stSgt, "knows General Moore...are you kidding me?!? He stood side by side with LtCol Moore in the Ia Drang in 65!! and lived to tell about it!!!" I went over and introduced myself...of course at the mention of ''Bob Barker'' he lit up like a Christmas tree. He said that you'd told for him to be on the lookout for me during his travels here.
We had a great chat. I don't think the young NCOs really had a clue who Joe was, but he didn't care. We chatted away for about 30 minutes. He told me all about the 40th Reunion. He said there were 1100 folks there and that it was a great event. He mentioned that he and Gen Moore are going to write another book this year.
He's pretty amazing. Full of you know what and vinegar and of course, some great stories. We both vowed to give you grief for sitting at home while we're both over here in a combat zone!!! HA! That's a laugh.
Anyway, all's well here. We're about 5 weeks out and we're working hard to finish our work here. The Marines are doing very, very well. Please keep up the support from back home!!
Love ya Uncle Bob. I hope we can hook up when I get home.
God bless,
Jim
1 comment:
As an old airman (not soldier, though we ARE allies ;-) ), I can attest to the joys of hanging out with the younger generation of warriors. I reconnected with the Air Force through my oldest son when I moved to New Mexico three years ago. I didn't realize just how much I was missing until then. Obviously, I'd been away much too long!
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