Reflections of My Past!

Review written by Bernie Weisz, Vietnam War Historian, Contact: [email protected] Pembroke Pines, Florida, USA May 29, 2011 Title of Review: "America Lost A Lot of Good Men In Vietnam:Taking a Hill, Occupying It For A Week Or So, Then Leaving It And Going On To Another" If the title of this review doesn't make sense to the reader, or for that matter you don't understand what happened to America or its debacle in Vietnam, Jack Hartzel's "Reflections of My Past" is the perfect remedy. While it delivers only 110 pages, it is literally packed with eye witness information that only a Marine combat veteran can provide. Jack Hartzel spent perhaps one of the tumultuous times in America on the other side of the world, as a Marine in Vietnam during what was called the 1967 "Summer of Love." This was a social phenomenon that occurred when as many as 100,000 people in the U.S. converged on the Haight-Ashbury neighborhood of San Francisco, creating a cultural and political rebellion. Predominately composed of anti war hippies, they were a melting pot of music, psychoactive drugs, sexual freedom, creative expression, and antiwar politics. However, 1967 was the turning point of the war in America, with the "Tet Offensive" of the following year being the icing on the cake. While Hartzel was patrolling "I Corps" near the boundry between North and South Vietnam known as the Demilitarized Zone, domestically in April 400,000 people marched from Central Park to the UN building in New York City to protest the war, where they were addressed by critics such as Benjamin Spock, Martin Luther King. On the same date 100,000 marched in San Francisco. The previous year, U.S. Secretary of Defense Robert S. McNamara ignominiously built an electronic "wall" around South Vietnam to remotely track the movement of supplies. This wall was given the name "The McNamara Line" ordered in conjunction with a covert U.S. Air Force electronic warfare operation code named "Igloo White." One particular combat base, Con Thien was intended to be used as a base for this line to prevent NVA infiltration across the DMZ. The firebase was strategically important because it offered unobstructed views for 9 miles east to the coast and north into North Vietnam. It equally vulnerable as it was within range of NVA artillery north of the DMZ which was largely unaffected by counter-battery fire. This multi-billion dollar program involved the implantation and monitoring of remote electronic sensors all along the Ho Ch

שנה

2001

שפה

English

הוצאה

BookSurge Publishing

מהדורות

1

עמודים

124

ISBN

9781588980793

מקור הנתונים: Wikidata