Has anybody ever met or talked to a combat veteran or POW who would talk much about his experience?

. . . just wondering

And no, not at all. I have found Vietnam Vets in particular will talk about after the war, recovering, PTSD etc. But as for bragging about the experience like McCaim, constantly and endlessly. Nope. And I know John Kerry made it part of his campaign, but he was nowhere near as shameless as McCain, not even in the same ballpark. If somebody questioned JK's health plan he didn't reply with an answer about him being a veteran.

Also, Kerry has tended since then to speak of his Vietnam experience only when he has tried to explain the difficulties the troops face in Iraq and elsewhere. He was brilliant in 2005 speaking of why the US should not be doing policing and Search and destroy in a country where we know neither the language or culture. This was explained through both the eyes of the US soldiers, never knowing what was behind the next door and the Iraqis.

Even in 2004, Kerry spoke of his medals only twice that I remember. Once on MTP, in response to a question he was asked about throwing them or the ribbons that represented them. Kerry said absolutely nothing about Vietnam and how he earned them. The second time was when he responded to the SBVT and basically reiterated that the simple truth was that the Navy gave him those medals. Even then, he simply listed them without saying why he got them.

I challenge anyone to find a quote where Kerry brags of saving the lives of his crew in one instance or saving Rassman. I have not seen one - and I have been active on the DU JK board where I made my first DU post over three years ago. The standard thing he said in 2004, was that he served his country in Vietnam as a young man, then came home to protest the war.

He used it as part of his bio, just as McCain should definitely do. It was integral in shaping both men. But you never hear John Kerry endlessly talking about it, and not just talking about it, but bragging and using it as an excuse. Chuck Hagel was in Vietnam, nobody hears him bragging every five minutes. Max Cleland was obviously in Vietnam, same thing. Wes Clark left Vietnam on a stretcher. Jim Webb is a legendary soldier, you never hear him bragging about it all the time. Jack Reed was an Army Ranger. Ted Kennedy was in the military, most people don't know that because he never says it.

But if you want to look at a genuine hero, look at Daniel Inouye. That man fought in the legendary Japanese Unit in WW2. He's seen and done things that were flat out amazing. Horrific combat too. But you never see or hear him bragging about it every 5 minutes or using it as an excuse when somebody disagrees with him on policy.

me... ditto

They get POW training, the acronym escapes me now, but sounds like SEAR. He told me that if the gubmint lost his paperwork and told him he'd have to go to the school again to keep his wings, he'd give them up in a heartbeat even though his lifelong ambition was to fly.

He described nightmarish things, like being put in a box on a stool. His head was bent because the box was too small. There was a small straw pointed at his cheek blowing a strong jet of air. After he didn't know how long, the air started to burn his skin. By the time he was let out of the box he didn't know if he was in there for 12 hours or 12 days. He shit himself. Puked. Pissed. The whole time, he listened to the sounds of the other pilots being mistreated. When the sun rose that day after our watch, I had a newfound respect for military officers. Before that, I hated them and thought them to be arrogant assholes. I'd even cross the street to avoid having to salute them.

Survival, Evasion, Resistance and Escape (my father went through that; he's shared a few hellish stories of the experience, too).

He saw action in both the European and Far Eastern theaters, and was wounded three times (once seriously). The only stories he ever told me about that time were the ones involving good times and the friends with whom he served. He never once spoke about combat, always changing the subject pointedly when I tried to steer it in that direction.

He was also wounded 3 times, once seriously. He never spoke to us kids about his experiences. Sometimes at the holidays when his brothers would come over and the whiskey was flowing he would talk about some war memories (never anything heavy) to them. I would always plant myself close to dad trying to hear whatever I could.

and a few beers had softened the guard of the veterans, some still in their twenties, some of them told me stuff... a lot of it scary but mostly what they were afraid of and how they coped. I never had any of them tell me of crossing the line, like if they had partaken in a My Lai incident or anything like that.

He never talked about combat if he had to. He was very elliptical and circular and I don't think he realized it. For him, he mostly talked about everything BUT the fighting experience like his comrades, his experience after, or what he got to see. But he never went into the "blood and guts" of it. Maybe it's also because to him, I was too young to be subjected to that. But he obviously saw a lot. It took a while for me to even get him to say anything more specific about the war and he was forthcoming only because he was so garrulous to begin with.

Most of them would prefer to avoid even thinking about it. But there are some who just vent at all times. Never in the boastfull manner that he does, though. Never once that. And working with Vets is my full time job.

He was a B-17 co-pilot and was shot down over Germany. His legs and hips were broken when he fell through the roof of a barn and the Germans shot his legs as he descended by parachute. He never fully healed and never was able to run again, although somehow he managed to stay in the service and later received a Bronze Star in Vietnam, flying little spotter planes.

He very seldom talked about his experience because he said it gave him bad, bad nightmares. He'd relive his plane catching fire and a couple of his crewmates getting trapped and unable to bail out. I remember when I was a kid that he'd shout out sometimes in the night.

87 years old and does not talk about it STILL.

Oh, I heard about his one time that he had the chance to ride in a bomber (and maybe so that the rest of the time) and as soon as the bottom of the plane opened and he was on the catwalk and went Nope, nope (also because those bombs killed kids and women, while as a sniper, he only killed men/soldiers)...he did not do that again.

The only other thing I heard was about the massive invasion that was going to happen, but then the bombs dropped in Japan and he went home...the things he told me about the build up in California in the days before that is actually frightening to me even to this day.

He tried ONE time to tell me about his friends and the Japanese, and he had to stop.

Never said a word about any of it. My uncles were in WWII and Korea, not a word out of any of them either. My husband's dad just told funny stories, like getting a bear drunk or something along those lines. McCain is pathetic and I don't like to criticize POW's of all people.

Most vets simply clamp down

from a German camp. Occasionally he would laugh about it in a Hogan's Heroes sort of way, but he never discussed it seriously. And he was only in a stalag for a few months after getting shot down as an Army Air Corps enlisted man.

I can tell you that he peeled potatoes and made 'jungle juice' for the guys.

Only once in all of my 52 years have I ever heard any serious conversation about his time there. He did admit that 'it was either them or me." End of discussion.

All of my Dad's close friends are vets. NONE of them talk about it.

My cousin did tours of duty in Vietnam. I'm pretty close to him. Never heard him utter one word.

I have a half brother who was also in Vietnam. Not a word.

once when I was a kid I asked about it and my mother told me to never ask him again because it was so upsetting to him. I never asked again and till the day he died just a few months ago he never talked about it.

fought in WW1, he never mentioned it as long as he was alive to any of us. I lost a great uncle who lied about his age to enlist and was captured on the front lines in Germany his second day there. Just a 17 year old kid. He died after three months in the prison camp, worked to death and starved. His brother, my maternal grandfather never spoke a word of it, except when he was dying ..... then he cried and asked if anyone had found out where his Johnny was buried in Germany. I worked in a bar for about 8 years with the typical town regulars ........ many who had fought in WW11, the only vet who talked about being captured would do it only when completely loaded, and then it was about the friends he left behind, never actually what he went through himself. John McCain is the only person I've ever heard go on about it the way he has. I think for many it's just too painful. Heck, I'm crying thinking about these men. Their lives were changed in so many ways and they lost so much. Gonna stop now, but McCain needs to stop the shit glamourizing 'service' / ie enlisting to die in these latest needless horrors. His mind is still back in VietNam.

a guy in the neighborhood was a vet. couldn't use his legs. He was popular with the kids and we would go over there all the time to visit him and hear his war stories. It was really cool.

This is an interesting fact--he didn't have the money to redo his entire house to be handicaped friendly--Ross Perot heard about it and covered the whole thing because he was a vet. (way back in like 1976.) that was the first time I ever heard to Perot (although I don't like him) have to give props for supporting the military,

Whatever happened to him--haven't heard anything in years.

Here's a radio interview he did recently. The site also has some current info on him.

http://blogs.zdnet.com/BTL/?p=9826&tag=rbxccnbzd1

He's got a website called Perot Charts

http://perotcharts.com/

check it out. not a big fan of his temper and eraticness--but he was a generous person to vets.

This veteran told me that whenever any military person needed an experimental procedure (one not covered by their medical insurance) because of something that happened in the line of duty--that Perot would pay for it. Just like that. He did it for a bunch of them. So even though he was a bit kooky he definitely had a good heart. He paid for several surgeries for this neighbor--and fixed up his house.

I never heard him ever say anything about it except that I made a plastic model airplane when I was a kid and he said that was the kind he flew. That was it but he scared us kids by sometimes sleepwalking and saying things we couldn't understand. Before the war he was a musician who had his own little Big Band and looked a lot like Glen Miller. After the war, no more music...

I hang around with a bunch of them (IVAW, VFP or VVAW.) We sometimes swap stories.

Some are very loquacious and talkative, others far more taciturn; different coping mechanisms for different personality types.

The one rule in my large, extended family was always: you never talk to him about the war. Never ask him about the war. Period.

He is a very sweet, intelligent man, but always has a haunted look in his eyes. I'm told that he still cries himself to sleep at night sometimes. I am also told by his daughter that he has been adamantly against war ever since. McCain makes him physically ill.

It's anecdotal, but important.

Bringing up war is a touchy subject with Vets. Some will talk about it, others won't. I suspect there are horrors some people never get over. I can see why McCain would make somebody like that physically ill.

tend to talk or brag tend to be those that saw little action.

And was at some of the major battles. For years, he wouldn't ever talk about his experiences in the war. He only opened up more about a year ago when his Parkinson's started to get worse. Maybe he is sensing the end and wants his children and grandchildren to know more about him. I don't know. My husband tells me his father never said a word about the war when he was a kid.

BTW, if my father-in-law can make it to the polls, he'll vote for Obama.

2 tours in Vietnam as a field-grade officer, and was awarded 2 Bronze stars. He's the same age as McSame and still won't talk about his service or what he did to earn those medals. The only story he's ever told about Vietnam was about a time he got stuck in a mud pit and had to be lifted out by a helicopter.

He almost never spoke about it. He had terrible survivor's guilt and it was only in the last few years of his life that he reconnected with some other POWs and was able to find a way to ease up on himself.

My grandma says he was never the same as he'd been before the war.

I have known him for about 11 years and have talked to him a few times about Vietnam. He had never mentioned being a POW until I found out how upset he was that McCain is exploiting his experience. McCain is using it purely for political gain and its fucking disgusting.

and lost friends and was nearly killed himself. He barely spoke of the horrors that haunt him to this day.

The only time I EVER heard a peep from him about it was when I moved to Seattle, and he told me how when he came back from the Pacific, their first stop was in Seattle, and how beautiful it was to him. It was a touching story (and it made me feel connected to him) and it was absolutely the only reference I ever heard him make to the war.

always notable exceptions. :shrug:

My uncle did 2 tours as an engineer. My FiL was in the pacific in WWII, he's the only one that would talk/brag about his war experiences.

About 10 years ago, my husband and I were eating at a seafood shack in Pensacola, and a Vietnamese woman was waiting on us. It turned out he was stationed on a base at the bottom of the mountain her village was on (He was USAF). At night, he and his buddies would climb to the roof of their barracks, smoke pot (probably laced with Agent Orange), and watch the Navy strafe the mountain she lived on. He walked out of that dinner in tears. He signed up before Vietnam was very hot, but ended up being there during Tet. Nope, he doesn't talk about it much at all, not even to me. He thought that war was wrong, and was against the Iraq war before it ever began.

My grandmother said my uncle would come home from his tours, and just sit for days and stare at the wall, saying nothing. Coincidentally, he knew McCain and graduated with him from the USNA.

eta

If you ask questions, he'll answer to a point, but he will never bring it up and won't elaborate on some things.