Xin Loi, Viet Nam by Al Sever

In 1966 the author, a high school grad from a dieing coal mining town in Pennsylvania, signed up for the Army because he always wanted to be a combat soldier. After basic training, he wiled away his time at Ft. Hood hoping to go to Viet Nam, not Detroit to quell riots. Soon, he was in Viet Nam and quickly grew tired of helicopter maintenance…he wanted to see combat. Got his wish when he was sent to a gunship company and became a crew chief. He saw a lot of action and death; he watched a close friend go down in flames; his twenty-six man platoon lost eight men in less than two months. He describes in great detail the life-threatening missions day after day. This young man became a hardened soldier quickly.

Feeling like an old man at twenty-one at the end of his three-year enlistment, he returned to Pennsylvania. He couldn’t adjust to civilian life and returned to the Army for another two years ‘til the War was basically over. He wasn’t happy about returning home the second time, either; he missed the courageous soldiers he had served with and felt he hadn’t accomplished anything.