I was nineteen when i was sent to the "beautiful" country,thats what they said. Not old enough to vote or buy a beer legally but i was old enough to kill ,for sure, I was old enough to kill.

I stepped off the ramp of the plane and was assaulted by the smell of cordite and human shit.The heat and humidity almost brought me down,thats tough on a kid,even a Marine trained kid.I knew right then I'd never leave that place.Then my LTs voice kicked in"get your ass moving Marine,this isn't a vacation".

Its amazing how resilient the human spirit is,We adapt,we always adapt.I chose a job I thought would keep me out of combat,not because i feared it , I wasn't smart enough for that,I just didn't like the idea of staying out in the bush for weeks at a time.

we had no choice like today.We had the Draft,it was,go to prison,run to Canada and become a hunted man,or spend a year in the Beautiful country.I couldn't dishonor my father and brother(both Marines in wartime,WW2 and Korea)so I enlisted in the Corps.My job was Intel and assessment.

I liked my job for a while.I hung out in suspect bars,whorehouses,and the like.All I did was listen,I was supposed to be an observer,what a crock of bullshit that turned out to be.I got slapped by the down side when my teams first assessment mission came down.There was a place,a free fire zone, that had networks of tunnels filled with bad ass little men in raggedy shorts and home made sandals,they were very good at killing GIs then disappearing into those tunnels.The higher ups wanted it stopped.They defoliated so those little men had fewer places to ambush from.Then they pumped gas into the tunnels but that didn't work so they poured water into them but that didn't work either.They even sent in some Crazy dudes with revolvers called Tunnel Rats.Someone way up the ladder decided to carpet bomb with B52s carrying five hundred pounders.From a distance it looked like someone opened a huge can of peas,exploding peas.When it was over five teams were sent in to do assessment,mine was one.

Walking through mother nature is a beautiful thing unless someones trying to kill you,then the fear is so powerful you can taste the bile coming up the back of your throat,visibility is ten feet and you know you can't stop cause that will get you dead.Many times on point I froze up and had to talk my self into moving again. your only option is to move on.Sometimes it took hours to go a hundred yards.

We got there at dusk,no time to set up for the night,just C rats and a dead tree to hold you up while you slept." Slept ",how could you sleep in a landscape of huge craters where every thing's dead and the trees are decorated with body parts like some evil Christmas...

Three days latter we documented and photographed enough to get the hell out of there. On our way back we ran into some rangers who grabbed a couple of VC somewhere. There Sargent knelt those dudes down and stepped behind them(we all knew what was coming,he had the Stare),he said"this is justice"then he ca-pd them both with his forty five."This is honor"and he put that forty five to his head and blew his brains out.That was my first taste of the Nam.Over the next couple of years I slid steadily down hill.

When we got back I started drinking,but that only made things worse.Another GI came over and told me he'd been where i was,that booze wouldn't help,that he had something that would.We left the bar and went to a crap building in a sleazy part of Saigon.That was the first time I"chased the dragon",it worked,for a while I was at peace, away from the beautiful country.Getting hooked didn't matter.I knew I wouldn't be going home anyway.

Over time my reality got so twisted I stayed for another tour.I even stopped keeping count of the days till may rotation.The beautiful country became my reality.I was OK as long as I had smack.

when I did come back there was no debriefing or transition.In thirty two hours I went from the jungles of the beautiful country to the airport of my home town. I still had clay under my nails.I tried to shake it off as i entered the terminal in my dress blues,a Proud Marine.

For two and a half years I dreamed of the beautiful women back home.A sweet looking hippie chick walked up to me smiling(I thought i remembered her from a dream).She told me I looked really good in my uniform.she admired the ribbons and medals.All the shit melted away.I almost felt normal,She said"can I ask you a question"?"sure babe".Her face got serious "how many babies did You kill"?Then she walked over to her friends and joined them in there smug little world while I caved in.

Well,I found some smack in town and went back to my peaceful reality.I couldn't live in a building for some reason and it was to painful to be around family and friends so i lived in the woods behind a radio station.I became a recluse. Hygiene stopped first,then everything became secondary to having my"medication".I stayed in that condition for two years.One night it was raining like hell.I hadn't eaten in days and worst of all I had run out of"medication".the visions were very strong that night.You see its not the things you did that stay with you,its the things you didn't do,something over looked,a hesitation,lives were lost.I wrestled my demons,some left,some never will.

Few people really understand the meaning of the word desolation, I do.God wasn't there that night and I couldn't find him .I remembered a bit of scripture"Many are called but few are chosen"followed by a whispered thought"You weren't",Some far away part of me spoke"either straighten out your shit or do the "Honorable" thing..,Jesus Christ boy your a Marine act like one"..... I've been piecing myself back together as best i can for many years now.I suppose it will never end.Funny thing about smack,it stops any healing from within.I guess thats not so funny after all.

."I've been to the edge,and then i stood and looked down, you know i lost allot of friends there baby,I got no time to mess around".

This "peace" is a voice for the fifty eight thousand "friends"who went to the"edge"and never came back.

America....why did you shame us?we were your children too....