Just about 10 years ago I read a book. Nothing unusual about that as I read approximately 150-200 books per year. What made this experience unique was that it was non-fiction, something that usually bores the bejeezus out of me. It was also about Vietnam, specifically, Vietnam in 1965 as it related to U.S. involvement there. Ironically, I can remember neither the name of the book or the author, but the contents may never leave my mind.
Turns out 1965 was the year it all changed...combat Marines waded ashore to some fanfare, massive troop buildups started, Air Cav units deployed and the Battle of the Ia Drang Valley, brought to us in the well written We Were Soldiers Once, And Young, brought home to all of us the ferocity and the cost of the war.
I read in that book that, sometime later, during the landmark libel case of Westmoreland vs. CBS, Defense Secretary McNamara testified that the November battle in the Ia Drang convinced him absolutely that we would not, could not win. At the time we had something just over or under 1000 dead. After he recognized the futility of the undertaking, no pun intended, we lost more than 57,000 more dead and many times that number wounded physically and psychologically.
My blood fairly boiled, or so it seemed. I began writing a stage play about the year and the decisions made that year, wanting to cast McNamara as the devil he seemed to be in real life. One of The Best and the Brightest, according to David Halberstam, a genius "without a lick of common sense," who couldn't figure out how to get us home and wasted the best of our generation in the process.
At about the same time, I began a two year course of spiritual studies at my church and found that, over time, that fire receded and I couldn’t maintain that level of anger and disgust necessary to finish the task. Instead, I began to detach from the experience and became, at least I hope I became, calmer, less intellectual and more heart centered in my approach to the past and my future. Letting go of that negative impulse (for the most part...we may well be spiritual beings but we do have some interesting human experiences) has allowed me to develop along different lines, eventually leading me to some important training involving potential from the lasting horrors of PTSD, hypervigilance and anxiety affecting veterans of Vietnam and all campaigns since. This tour will, I hope put this training to the test.
