I was in the gym this morning and speaking with a retired Baptist preacher. The day was so warm I had a short-sleeved navy shirt that my nephew Patrick had given me. The preacher asked me if I had been in the navy. I said that I had and he asked me when I had been in the navy. I responded 1963 to 1974 so he said all through the Vietnam war. I agreed.
All of my time was spent in the pacific and was in warm weather, except for when the Pueblo was captured in January 1968. The Kitty Hawk was sent from the warmth of the coast of Vietnam toward the cold of North Korea to kick some serious ass and get that ship back. We were two days in that direction when the politicals running the country decided to let those sailors and their ship stay in North Korea, so we headed back to Vietnam to aid in the bombing there.
I thought about that today after the conversation with the preacher. As I thought about that in 1968, I remembered the Korean war and remembered a video seeing flight deck sailors off North Korea shoveling snow off the flight decks of carriers during the harsh winters there. I was lucky that I never had to shovel snow from frozen flight decks. The flight decks of aircraft carriers are covered with oil from planes and having a layer of ice and snow on top of that had to be a tremendous hazard for those sailors and would have been bad for us. The disappointment was that we were ready to save our brothers from the Pueblo and the politicians prevented that.
I do not think we can ever win wars that are ruled by politicians and not by admirals and generals. That has been proven in Iraq, and Afghanistan. I feel so very sorry for the brave young men who have had to fight there.
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