BOLO: Stolen Valor/FAKE Vietnam Vet

[Omega]

Being a front line special ops troop must be the safest job in the military. When I was in (1969-1973) about 12% of the military were some sort of combat troop, Marine, airman, sailor, etc... The other 88% were cooks, drivers, admin, quartermasters, etc... Now I only meet highly decorated combat veterans and I wonder what happened to the REMFs. If it weren't for all the people supporting the men (back then we didn't have lady combatants) in the field, we'd have been up the creek very quickly. I don't blame the wantabees for their lies. Being in the US military was a great experience and I think Vietnam was our best war. Lots of pretty women, booze, drugs (if you like it), and the best music ever (plus free ammo!).

I am not old enough for Nam, but am one of those support people you speak of. Though I found myself on the front line on a few occasions due to my logistical job as well as my main job as a FARP team member, I was not a "door kicker" and will never portray myself as one. I could never understand the mentality of those that out and out lie about their military service, specially when they had none. I worked along side many spec ops troops and their heroism is their own and I consider it very disrespectful of those that want to bathe in their light.

[Ballistics in Scotland]

I think there are two reasons people usually get away with this. We are rightly reluctant to check up from the internet etc. on people we know personally. Less excusably, a lot of people don't want concern for mere fact to intrude on a story that excites them.

It is a low, self-glorifying act. The only thing healthy about it is that a small minority doing this, is a whole lot better than a large minority treating soldiers as near-criminal because they got themselves sent to Vietnam. It is an improvement. But theft...? Don't you define theft as taking someone's property with the intention of permanently depriving him of it? The last bit is not going to happen.

I once got a very good grade in college because a very senior member of staff had been a Wing-Commander in Special Operations in wartime, and he and his friends stole a train in Bombay. They had a good reason of course. They were drunk. Well what could anyone do to them that was worse than sending them up the jungle? They'd been, and were going again. He loved me because I told him he couldn't possibly have deprived the railway permanently of its train. There was no kind of corruption, of course, just a private tutorial with coffee and biscuits any time anything puzzled me.

No, all those posers deserve is a sad little life in which people despise them, either due to latching onto the falsities, or just to an instinctive feeling that they have something the matter with them. Come to think of it, they've probably got that already.

[Rhou45]

Now I only meet highly decorated combat veterans and I wonder what happened to the REMFs. If it weren't for all the people supporting the men (back then we didn't have lady combatants) in the field, we'd have been up the creek very quickly.

The REMF's are still there, but on today's battlefield the enemy is everywhere. There is no line seperating between us and enemy territory, we are imbedded amoungst them. Today's enemy took the entire North Vietmenanse playbook and aded their own twist to it.

The REMF's get mortared regularly (if not nightly), and shot at or blown up on every supply run to support the comabt arms guys. As you see on the news ocassionally, the enemy tries to get onto the FOBs/COPS in order to kill inside the fence lines. Often as members of the local police force or host country army.

REMF's will always be there, but the enemy has found it easier to attack REMF's than force on force in combat. The US Army can destroy any other force in a stand up fight, therefore they will not stand. Easier to blend in and sucker punch us when they can.

[Rhou45]

But theft...? Don't you define theft as taking someone's property with the intention of permanently depriving him of it? The last bit is not going to happen.

No, all those posers deserve is a sad little life in which people despise them, either due to latching onto the falsities, or just to an instinctive feeling that they have something the matter with them.

Stolen Valor is theft, if the faker uses it to obtain any personal gain, and it has been done for such. Fakers have been caught using fake credientials to make a profit. It is a real crime.

[NavyVet1959]

I always figured they did it because they had some mental issues. Low self-esteem or something like that.

Some of us are vets and freely admit that we just did our jobs and there was nothing heroic about it. We might have some good sea stories, but they are usually about doing something stupid and Darwin being asleep on the job.

[Omega]

The REMF's are still there, but on today's battlefield the enemy is everywhere. There is no line seperating between us and enemy territory, we are imbedded amoungst them. Today's enemy took the entire North Vietmenanse playbook and aded their own twist to it.

The REMF's get mortared regularly (if not nightly), and shot at or blown up on every supply run to support the comabt arms guys. As you see on the news ocassionally, the enemy tries to get onto the FOBs/COPS in order to kill inside the fence lines. Often as members of the local police force or host country army.

REMF's will always be there, but the enemy has found it easier to attack REMF's than force on force in combat. The US Army can destroy any other force in a stand up fight, therefore they will not stand. Easier to blend in and sucker punch us when they can.

There are a few support roles that though not Direct Action (DA) their jobs take them into hostile territory. Our Helo crews, Downed Aircraft Recovery Teams (DART), Forward Airborne Rearming and Refueling (FARP) team, and of course Combat Search And Rescue (CSAR) teams would many times be out amongst the DA guys doing their part. Due to the way the enemy has slipped into guerrilla war tactics there is no real "safe" area in theater. We used to get mortared on a daily basis by some guys in a pickup truck, they were usually not very successful at hitting anything but you had to be cautious moving around many areas of the Forward Operating Base (FOB). If you walked around looking at the Hesco barriers at any of the FOBs you would see AK, mortar fragments, and even RPG fragments in them. My hooch was by the fuel bags and every afternoon when I woke (I worked at night) I would have to inspect it for leaks and clear any debris around them so the rotor wash wouldn't hurt anything or anyone. In the morning when I was ready to go to sleep, I would wait until EOD would take care of the Unexploded Ordinance (UXO) otherwise I would be awakened anyway. Damned inconsiderate of that mortar team to wait until my sleep time to try and hit us I must say.

[Love Life]

Everybody wants a piece of the attaboy pie. Why people feel the need to lie about their service is beyond me. Heck, you even have active duty service members faking the funk...like you can't tell they are full of poo from their shamefully small ribbon rack or mosey on over to MILPERS and check their record. I know myself and my former squad members rarely ever talk about the bad things in war unless we are all together tying one on.

A question that gets my goat is when an instructor asks a class "Who has been in combat?" and a whole slew of sandwich clamps hit the air. Sorry buddy, just because you were "Over there" doesn't mean you were in combat. Actual ground combat of a prolonged nature. The best thing to ask them is:

[bruce drake]

Lovelife just reminded me of my Captain's Career Course in 2005 after I had a year-long tour in Iraq and a REMF Instructor Captain with a Gulf War Combat Patch asked how many of us had seen combat... of the 25 of us, the only ones not have been in combat at small-arms distances was 3 National Guard female officers and a Reservist who was trying to get on Active duty and the Egyptian Foreign Exchange Officer...80%...

Later, the dumbarse asked how did we expect to make company commander with some of the discussions we had regarding non-book responses to logisitical resupply and convoy operations...16 of us had already served as a Company Commander for a year or more before we even attended the course...

We later found out he had been pulled out of theatre and company commander early the year prior and he had only served in Kuwait...The end of course reviews were harsh to say the least...

Me, just serve and protect...the rest comes natural. I personally get very angry when I constantly hear from civilians, "Thank You For Your Service." How do I respond to that... "Sorry I didn't see you on my flank in Iraq..."

[Love Life]

HAHA!!!

That reminds of a time a 2ndLt said something that blew our minds (took a lot to do that). OD green under armor shirts had just hit the PX, and my buddy was one of the first in the platoon to get some. He was wearing one when we got caught up for a working party and told to drop our blouses as we could do the working party in boots and utes.

Well, the LT sees this fancy new shirt on my buddy and immediately goes high and to the right. Then he said it..."If you get shot with a flamethrower, the material will stick to your skin!!!". I remember that the retardedness of the statement actually caused me to drop my smoke.

My buddy didn't miss a beat and responded with "If I get shot with a flamethrower then I have other s-word to worry about than my shirt sticking to my skin." and carried on business as usual. As soon as the LT left, he looked at me with a look of bewilderment and proceeded to spend the next two hours of the working party making boot jokes about the LT.

The LT actually ended up being good to go once we got him broken in, but that is a story for another day.

[NavyVet1959]

I personally get very angry when I constantly hear from civilians, "Thank You For Your Service." How do I respond to that... "Sorry I didn't see you on my flank in Iraq..."

Well, they mean well, so don't let it bother you. I get that sometimes, but it's too much trouble to explain that the closest I ever came to "action" was a fight in a bar or breaking up a fight between some drunken sailors when I was pulling SP duty. They had this recruitment slogan -- "Navy... It's not just a job... It's an ADVENTURE"... Well, for some of us, it really did just end up being a job -- a job with long hours, crappy pay, and crappy food. After awhile, it really doesn't matter where you were in the world, it all looked the same -- haze gray and underway...

[Larry Gibson]

Now this is no s**t........

There I was on the north fork of the humongous river...........

We were up to our a** in brass........

Knee deep in grenade pins........

Odds were probably 50 to 1 at least and we were surrounded........

Went to hand to hand combat...........

and you know what..........

one of those 2 b*st*ards darn near got away from us..........hey, buy me another beer and I'll tell ya another..............

Larry Gibson

[SeabeeMan]

HAHA!!!

That reminds of a time a 2ndLt said something that blew our minds (took a lot to do that). OD green under armor shirts had just hit the PX, and my buddy was one of the first in the platoon to get some. He was wearing one when we got caught up for a working party and told to drop our blouses as we could do the working party in boots and utes.

Well, the LT sees this fancy new shirt on my buddy and immediately goes high and to the right. Then he said it..."If you get shot with a flamethrower, the material will stick to your skin!!!". I remember that the retardedness of the statement actually caused me to drop my smoke.

My buddy didn't miss a beat and responded with "If I get shot with a flamethrower then I have other s-word to worry about than my shirt sticking to my skin." and carried on business as usual. As soon as the LT left, he looked at me with a look of bewilderment and proceeded to spend the next two hours of the working party making boot jokes about the LT.

The LT actually ended up being good to go once we got him broken in, but that is a story for another day.

It wasn't just Seabee Officer's spouting that line about Under Armor being out biggest worry if we ever got hit?!

My next younger brother was a borderline (probably past the line, but he's my brother) stolen valor guy for a little bit. He got into a bunch of legal trouble during high school and somehow they let him join the Army Reserve. He went to boot camp, came back home, and never reported to a drill or for his deployment. About 6 months later he finally got picked on a B&E with his financed vehicle he had never made a payment on full of stolen property. He went off to prison for a few years and the military basically said "you were never here, we don't know you."

My youngest brother and I were both home at one point and one of his buddies, who proudly (he thought he had outsmarted them) malingered his way out of the Navy after 6 months in boot camp and med hold, started talking to all 3 of us about being in the military. We started catching on about middle brothers stories and after a little digging we figured it. We told him that if we ever heard of him talking like that again, it would be a beating the likes of which he couldn't imagine.

Mom told us later that we scared the tar out of him and that he had spent the next week telling people never to mention it again and that he had his story wrong.

[Love Life]

It wasn't just Seabee Officer's spouting that line about Under Armor being out biggest worry if we ever got hit?!

Ya'll got the same line. That's funny right there. The way the brass downed under armor at first would lead one to believe that the whole institution was in danger of being disbanded if under armor caught on. Then one day it was magically acceptable.

[kfarm]

OK I'm up for one more exciting tale from my trip to the delta. On fine morning in 1969 my unit (heavy contruction) who was on TDY to Vietnam was told to go out and fix some pot holes in the highway. Apparently being a photographer wasn't going to get me out of the trip cause the brass always wanted pictures of what their troops did so off I went. It was me and several others in this helicopter going off to battle well fix pot holes. I'm a small guy 5'4" and about 100 lbs at the time so the Capt. Says give camera the 60. OK now I have 2 cameras, a M14 now a dang M60 with the extra barrel and stuff. The chopper stops and hovers, I'm thinking he's going to land so short stuff here can get out. WRONG, at about 3' I'm in the door with 6 or 8 guys behind me yelling get out. Next thing I know I'm flying out with more arms than I got arms. I land face down on the 60 spitting out teeth, as I try to get up and find out what exactly happened, I'm thrown back on to the helicopter with all my stuff going back to base. A medic gave me a shot and I rode back with my head out the door like a dog feeling no pain. Well I never did get pictures of the fixed pot holes but did hear the guys did a darn good job putting dirt back in the bomb crater. And that no enemy action was seen, thank goodness cause I had the M60 back at base with me. Its been a long time since then and have had a real dentist fix my two front teeth so they look natural but sometimes I look in the mirror and remember the day I heroically jumped out of a chopper M60 in hand ready to battle the enemy. And that's the truth by golly.

[Rufus Krile]

kfarm... so, did you ever live down kissing the pig? Friend of mine in the reserves told me their equipment was so old, he thought one of the 60's had been mine... I asked him "Why, did it smell like p1$$?"

[JWT]

I used to work with a Viet Nam vet. We worked out of town so we tended to spend our nonworking time together as well. In 5 years of working together every day and having dinner at each others apartments 3 times a week, Denny didn't talk about his service. I did get a few stories of the lengths he would have to go to so he could go to concerts when he was on leave without being hassled. He once mentioned that he was a sniper. Denny Matthes died about ten years ago and I still have his company sticker on my hard hat.

[kfarm]

I guess since we were only support we never did get caught up in a lot of slang. Only years later did I learn of guys calling 60's pigs. They were just called 60's sometimes M60's in the 293rd heavy construction unit. But it seemed like only the little guys had them. Oh! at mi size I had the opportunity to to be a tunnel rat but I gladly declined and rose to the position of 84B (photographer)

[fatelk]

My grandfather was in WWII, never told me anything about it until the last year of his life, and then it was some stories about the occupation of Japan. Very interesting, stuff I'd never heard anywhere else. He was a railroad guy, never in combat.

[LUBEDUDE]

............. Oh! at mi size I had the opportunity to to be a tunnel rat but I gladly declined and rose to the position of 84B (photographer)

Now a Tunnel Rat!, that just HAD to be one of the highest stress, adrenaline rush jobs. Up there with the explosive guys. Just you, your brains, and your nerve.
No screwing around or sleeping at the wheel here.

[duckey]

Check out Don Shipley on the YouTube. He is a retired SEAL and he video records his phone cons with fakers, calls em right out. Its amazing how many DO NOT fess up. Most seem to do it to get business for themselves. It is quite entertaining to watch.