Vietnam and Iraq veterans become brothers in arms
Survivors of unpopular American wars build a rapport over shared experiences
FORT LEWIS, Wash. - Soldiers have come home from war since Ulysses' turbulent return to Ithaca - to tearful wives and cranky babies, to brass bands playing John Philip Sousa marches, and to potlucks of casseroles and coleslaw laid out by neighbors.
For men like Larry Criteser, though, there were no trombones or baked beans. Not in 1969, when he got off a flight from Saigon at the massive Army terminal in Oakland, Calif., and spent a fitful night alone at San Francisco International Airport, unaware that the sight of his carefully pressed uniform would draw so much fire.
"I spent the night getting heckled," recalled Criteser, 60, a retired welder from Eugene, Ore. "One of the favorite expressions was 'baby killer.' I have consciously tried to forget most of it. It wasn't my job to go over there and kill babies."
Criteser waited 39 years for his official welcome home. It came recently one chilly morning at this Army post south of Tacoma, right where it should have been - on a military parade ground with a marching band, bleachers of waving families, and rows of soldiers in neat formation on a wide, green lawn.
Officially, it was the homecoming ceremony for the 600-plus members of the Fourth Battalion, Ninth Infantry "Manchu" Regiment, returned from their 14-month deployment as the northern arm of the "surge" in Iraq. But nine older men standing uncertainly to one side, in cotton shirts and summer suits, had been told it was their welcome home, too.
"It's been a long time . . . but your service is no less appreciated in this nation than that of the men who stand before you," said Lieutenant Colonel William Prior, who commands the current incarnation of the Manchus brigade, the unit in which the older men served as young infantry recruits in Vietnam.
"Keep up the fire," responded Larry James, 62, who commanded a platoon of Manchus near Cu Chi, Vietnam, until 1969.
The two most unpopular American wars of the last century have found an intersection of sorts here in Washington, where an unusual friendship has taken hold between veterans of a war that ended in Southeast Asia 33 years ago and newly battle-honed soldiers with the "4/9" brigade, who shipped out for Iraq in March 2007.
Over the last 14 months, as the soldiers spread out through the date palm groves and dusty villages north of Baghdad, battling insurgents and building alliances with local leaders, they have been in constant communication with 4/9 veterans of the Vietnam era. They have exchanged photographs, e-mails, and packages, and - unit commanders hope - established friendships that will help guide the returning servicemen through the newly difficult terrain called home.
"They always compare this war to their war," said Corporal John Joss, 25, who lost a leg to a roadside bomb near Tarmiya, Iraq. "The enemy's the same, almost. It's not fighting like it should be. They just blow our stuff up and run off. I always knew when we went over that the Vietnam guys would be behind us, because they know what it's like to fight an enemy that doesn't fight right."
The Vietnam veterans say they feel a sense of kinship to their old fighting unit.
"As soon as I heard they were coming home, I told my wife, I said, 'I'm going. You coming?' She said, 'Yeah,' " said Johnny Guidry, 60, who flew in from Raceland, La. "They needed closure, just like I did. They needed a response from their people; they needed a response from their older brothers, like we are, and, yes, a welcome home."
Much has happened between the fall of Saigon in 1975, when America was paralyzed with demonstrations opposing the war, and 2008, which comes after the Sept. 11 attacks and a war on terrorism many see as vital to the nation's survival.
"I think the American people have realized they blamed the wrong people in Vietnam," said Doug Richardson, mayor of the nearby city of Lakewood, who attended the ceremony. "There's been a realization that if you are unhappy with the war, the fact is the military guys go because they were told to go."
Criteser is less convinced. He found himself wondering why no one but family members and Vietnam veterans showed up at the July 1 welcome home. The answer, for him, was that things hadn't changed all that much.
"People today are extremely selfish," he said. "Why couldn't anybody from the community have shown up? You don't need a son or a dad or a husband coming home to come out and welcome them home."
The 4/9 unit, as is often the case, was inactivated periodically but re-formed in 2006, with a complement of infantrymen and officers assigned from all over the Army. The new commanders sought out Vietnam War veterans to provide a bridge to the Manchus' storied past.
Vietnam had proved one of the darkest chapters in its history. On March 2, 1968, 92 Manchus from C Company were patrolling near the Saigon River when Viet Cong guerrillas trapped them in a withering hail of gunfire, killing 49 and wounding 28 in eight minutes. It was among the most devastating losses of the war.
Criteser was in D Company, which came up from the rear and found its comrades dead and bleeding in the road, some clutching small Bibles and photographs, some clustered in groups, as if for a last attempt at mutual salvation and comfort.
James tracked down Criteser and other veterans. He returned to Vietnam and found members of the Viet Cong who had carried out the ambush. Ultimately, he said, "Unfortunate Sons," his book, became about "what it's like to die for your country."
Already, the debut of the Internet had opened the locked doors of the past to allow the Vietnam Manchus to reconnect with the men who had shared some of the most important events of their lives. A website, www.manchu.org, created in the mid-1990s, quickly became a lifeline for vets who had been foundering in often-troubled isolation for decades.
"All of a sudden you had someone to talk to about the experiences, the years that had gone by, someone who you knew would understand what you were talking about," Criteser said.
