By Vietnam Army Veteran Jim Janicki After reading the “Coming Home After War” issue of VBC Magazine, I felt compelled to share my own story. I enlisted in the U.S. Army on October 31, 1966, and served until September 17, 1969. I trained at Fort Jackson, South Carolina, and then at Fort Eustis, Virginia,
Jeremy in front of a destroyed Russian armored vehicle outside the former compound of the Taliban’s supreme leader Mullah Omar, May 2002. (Jeremy D. Baker) By Jeremy D. Baker Jeremy D. Baker is a former Army counterintelligence agent, combat veteran and novelist. As part of the 202nd Military Intelligence Battalion, he
By Charlotte Crosswhite The Army Security Agency (ASA) was a unique military experience. Whether you served in small assignments, large field stations, or combat situations, you always had one boot in the Army and the other in the NSA’s door. I wouldn’t call us isolated, but in many ways, we were self-isolating. You don’t
By Larry Hertzberg During the summer after my freshman year of college, I stayed at home, doing little more than hanging out with friends, drinking, shooting pool, and chasing girls. Truth be told, those were the main reasons I had gone to college in the first place. One evening in August 1963, just before
Written by John Duresky After we ran our VBC Magazine piece asking “When is V-J Day?” I heard from historian John Duresky, co-author (with David Britt) of Relentless Hope: A True Story of War and Survival about Bataan Death March survivor Chester Britt. John noticed the radio in our V-J Day photo from 1945
One of the great things of working with veterans and their families is hearing stories that don’t make it into textbooks. For those of us who care about history, these first-hand and second-hand memories present both a challenge and an opportunity. How do we preserve these stories of World War II as their tellers
