**I received this from a nephew {Ex-Army} yesterday, and was asked to pass it on. **
**THEY DON’T COME ALONG TOO OFTEN: **
**As I came out of the supermarket that sunny day, pushing my cart of
**groceries towards my car, I saw an old man with the hood of his car up and a ****lady sitting inside the car, with the door open. ****
****The old man was looking at ****the engine. I put my groceries away in my car and continued to watch the old ****gentleman from about twenty-five feet away. I saw a young man in his early ****twenties with a grocery bag in his arm, walking towards the old man… ****
****The old ****gentleman saw him coming too and took a few steps towards him. I saw the old ****gentleman point to his open hood and say something. The young man put his ****grocery bag into what looked like a brand new Cadillac Escalade and then **turn back to the old man and I heard him yell at the old gentleman saying,
**‘You shouldn’t even be allowed to drive a car at your age’ And then with a **wave of his hand, he got in his car and peeled rubber out of the parking lot.
**I saw the old gentleman pull out his handkerchief and mop his brow as he ****went back to his car and again looked at the engine. He then went to his ****wife and spoke with her and appeared to tell her it would be okay. ****
****I had ****seen enough and I approached the old man. He saw me coming and stood **straight and as I got near him I said, 'Looks like you’re having a problem.'
**He smiled sheepishly and quietly nodded his head. I looked under the hood ****myself and knew that whatever the problem was, it was beyond me. ****
****Looking ****around I saw a gas station up the road and told the old gentleman that I ****would be right back. I drove to the s station and went inside and saw three ****attendants working on cars. I approached one of them and related the problem ****the old man had with his car and offered to pay them if they could follow me ****back down and help him. ****
****The old man had pushed the heavy car under the shade ****of a tree and appeared to be comforting his wife. When he saw us he ****straightened up and thanked me for my help. ****
****As the mechanics diagnosed the ****problem (overheated engine) I spoke with the old gentleman. When I shook ****hands with him earlier he had noticed my Marine Corps ring and had commented about it, telling me that he had been a Marine too.
****I nodded and asked the usual question, ‘What outfit did you serve with?’ He had mentioned that he sserved with the first Marine Division at Tarawa, Saipan, Iwo Jima and ****Guadalcanal.He had hit all the big ones and retired from the Corps after the war wasover.
As we talked**,**** we heard the car engine come on and saw the mechanics lower the ******hood. They came over to us as the old man reached for his wallet, but was ****stopped by me and I told him I would just put the bill on my AAA card. ****
****He ****still reached for the wallet and handed me a card that I assumed had his ****name and address on it and I stuck it in my pocket. We all shook hand s all ****around again and I said my goodbye’s to his wife. ****
****I then told the two ****mechanics that I would follow them back up to the station. Once at the ****station I told them that they had interrupted their own jobs to come along ****with me and help the old man. I said I wanted to pay for the help, but they ****refused to charge me. ****
****One of them pulled out a card from his pocket looking ****exactly like the card the old man had given to me. ****
****Both of the men told me ****then, that they were Marine Corps Reserves. Once again we shook hands all ****around and as I was leaving, one of them told me *I should look at the card *****the old man had given to me and I said I would and drove off. ****
****For some ****reason I had gone about two blocks when I pulled over and took the card out ****of my pocket and looked at it for a long, long, time. ****
****The name of the old gentleman was on the card in golden leaf and under his name… "Congressional Medal of Honor Society." I sat there motionless looking at the card and reading it over and over.
****I looked up from the card and smiled to no one but myself and marveled that **on this day, four Marines had all come together, because one of us needed
**help… **
He was an old man alright, but it felt good to have stood next to greatness and courage and an honor to have been in his presence.
**America is not at war. The U.S. Military is at war. America is at the ****Mall.
I cannot begin to express the deep and heartfelt gratitude that I feel towards this “Old Gentleman” who has sacrificed so much for his country.
His honor, integrity, personal sacrifice, and devotion to duty and to his country exemplifies what makes America such a great nation.
He is truly “The Best of the Best”.
I want to thank each and everyone of you who has donned our country’s uniform’s in the service of our great nation.
I also want to thank all of you who have not served in the military but who have wholeheartedly and enthusiastically supported our nation and more importantly our troops in their time of great need.
It saddens me when I see some of our own American Citizens glibly criticizing our country, our government, and our troops without taking the time to consider that it is people like this “Older Gentleman” and our Nation’s Servicemen and Women who provide them with the freedom and the ability to be able to so nonchalantly criticize the country who has provided them with such extraordinary freedoms.
Even in “Hard Times” we live in the finest nation on this planet!
This is due to the courage and sacrifice of our American servicemen and women and the hardships that they are willing to endure in the service of our country.
I ask each and everyone of you to keep them in your prayers.
“They just kept passing it around there were eight or nine or ten of them who handled it before it was over,” he said.
"They had found it in my pocket at the airport, and they thought it was suspicious. It’s shaped like a star, and they were looking at the metal edges of it, like it was a weapon. I asked for it back, but they kept handing it to each other and inspecting it. I was told to move to a separate area.
"I told them; just turn it over. The engraving on the back explains everything. But they thought they must have something potentially dangerous here.
“I told them exactly what it was; I said, 'That’s my Congressional Medal of Honor.´”
The man relating that story was retired Gen. Joe Foss, 86. His experience in Arizona at the international airport in Phoenix; may be the ultimate symbol of the out-of-kilter times we are going through. We are so afraid of terrorists in our midst that what happened to Foss is not only believable, but perhaps even inevitable:
The Congressional Medal of Honor will be taken from its recipient because it looks vaguely ominous.
I spoke with Foss because I wanted to hear it from him directly. He told me that he holds no animosity about the incident; “I’m just as interested in defeating the terrorists as anyone is, I promise you that” and that he is mostly sad that no one knew what the Medal of Honor was.
Foss was awarded the medal by President Franklin D. Roosevelt during World War II after shooting down 26 enemy planes as a Marine fighter pilot in solo combat in the Pacific. He grew up in South Dakota; after the war he would become governor of that state; and took flying lessons as a young man, then went to war.
He lives in Scottsdale, Ariz., and when he travels he is patted down in airports instead of going through the metal detectors, because of a heart pacemaker. At the airport in Phoenix, he said, he was being searched manually and he put his jacket through the X-ray machine. A couple of things caught the attention of the screeners; rightly so.
Foss has a key chain made out of a dummy bullet, with a hole drilled through it to make it evident it is harmless; he also carries a small knife/file with the Medal of Honor Society’s insignia on it. The screeners took both of them from Foss; traveling during these nervous days with items that look like bullets, or with even a small knife, will, and should, invite scrutiny. Even if you’re 86. Even if you’re a war hero.
That’s not what frustrated him. The screeners, he said, allowed him to mail the key chain and the little knife back to his home from the airport. But for 45 minutes, he estimated, he was passed from person to person, made to remove his boots and tie and belt and hat three different times, and prevented from boarding his flight (he was eventually allowed on) because the security personnel, he said, had misgivings about his Medal of Honor.
(America West Airlines, in whose terminal in Phoenix the incident allegedly took place, said through a spokeswoman shortly after the misunderstanding that the airline’s objective is to ensure safety and security for all passengers and employees.)
“I want you to know,” Foss told me, “that I don’t go around wearing my Medal of Honor, or carrying it with me. The only reason I had it with me on this flight was that I was supposed to give a speech to a class at the United States Military Academy at West Point, and I thought the medal was something the cadets might be interested in seeing.”
I asked him what he remembered about being presented the Congressional Medal of Honor. “I was right fresh out of combat when I was called to the White House,” he said. "FDR was behind his desk, and he pinned the medal on my uniform. He said it was for actions above and beyond the call of duty.
“I was nervous, being in the presence of the president. I think I may have been more nervous there than I was in combat. My wife and mother were with me; it was quite a day. I think President Roosevelt called me ‘young feller.’”
After the White House ceremony, Foss had his photograph taken with the medal; the nation’s highest military honor for valor in action; on his uniform. That photo was the full front cover of Life magazine, the issue of June 7, 1943; the cover caption was: “Captain Foss, U.S.M.C. America’s No. 1 Ace.”
And now, almost 60 years later, the Medal of Honor was being handed from one skeptical security screener to another in the Phoenix airport, while Foss, at 86, took his boots and belt off as ordered.
“I wasn’t upset for me,” he said. “I was upset for the Medal of Honor, that they just didn’t know what it even was. It represents all of the guys who lost their lives; the guys who never came back. Everyone who put their lives on the line for their country. You’re supposed to know what the Medal of Honor is.”
Shame on them for not recognizing our Nations Highest Award for Bravery!
Shame on these so called “Americans” who live in such a protected lazy and ignorant society that they did not take the time to learn our nations history.
In My Opinion they did not deserve the Honor to be able to hold such an esteemed award in their ignorant hands!
Instead of sullying our Nations Highest award they should have formed an Honor Guard and escorted this Gentleman to his gate and he should have been given a free seat in the “First Class Cabin” and an apology for his inconvenience and for his delay!
My God … What is wrong with our youth!
This generation will never know the hardships and sacrifices that so many have made so that they can be free to live in the finest nation on Earth!
John,
I am disgusted and appalled by this story but … I want to thank you for bringing this to our attention.
We as a Nation owe our “Living Legends” all of the respect and Honor that we can give them while they are still alive.
I had dinner with my Uncle Frank last week in LA. I asked him a little about his Marine service in the Pacific during WWII. Some how the discussion turned to Japanese POW’s, and my liberal, NRA member, retired marine, retired teacher/principal, democrat, Uncle Frank said, “you know Brian, I never saw a Japanese Prisoner until I was on the Chinese mainland at the end of the war.”
I think I’ll take him to the range when he visits next week.
Thank You to those that served and to those that serve today.
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When I was in Viet Nam some of our older Sergeants had served in World War II and Korea!
They had C.I.B.'s {Combat Infantry Badges} with not one but Two Stars! They earned their 3rd Star in Viet Nam.
Us “younger” Green Berets stood in awe of them.
Please give your Uncle Frank my “Warmest Regards”. I would love to meet him and to be able to shake his hand and to thank him for his service to our Country!
My father-in-law was one of those folks. He served in the Army in WWII in Europe then with the occupation forces there after the war. My ex was born in Bremerhaven, Germany. He then served in Korea and was an early ‘adviser’ in Viet Nam where he earned the Silver Star. He never talked much about his experiences but once a couple of years ago while sitting around the Thanksgiving dinner table he casually mentioned that he was thankful that he survived his helicopter being shot down in Viet Nam. We all set there dumbfounded… none of his 4 children or even his wife ever knew that had happened. I really can’t imagine the other memories he holds to himself.
About 4-5 years ago I was at a seminar in San Antonio. I hopped a shuttle bus from my hotel to the airport. Bunch of old farts were on the shuttle. All probably in their 70’s or 80’s. I’d seen them at the hotel and in the elevators that week. Figured it must be some old age retirement party or something.
They moved so slow they really blocked everything. Very annoying. They got off the bus before I did. I made a comment to the driver about those old farts clogging the hotel restaurants, the bus, etc. He told me they’d earned that right AND it was a reunion of the living “Congressional Medal of Honor Winners”. I was overwhelmed and shamed.
I got off at the next terminal and went back to talk to them. Amazing.
I just learned during a recent reunion at my home that my my Great Uncle Leo earned the bronze star in WWII as a machine gunner for (in his words) “killin’ Germans”. I’ve known him all my life and never knew that about him. His brother Ed was a highly decorated fighter pilot, never knew that either (but now I know why his hobby was model planes).
Strange world that we live in. My mother is german and was bombed out of her home in the submarine building port city of Kiel when she was a very young child.
To be able to meet not one but *several *Congressional Medal of Honor Recipients!
Many people do not understand what it takes to be considered for such an award. Here is an example.
Roy Benavidez was a living legend in Special Forces.
I never personally met him but I would have considered it an Honor and a Privilege to meet and shake this man’s hand. Benavidez](Benavidez)
**
Medal of Honor Recipient
** Master Sergeant Roy Benavidez
Born: August 5, 1935 - Died: November 29, 1998
As the medevac chopper landed the wounded were examined one by one.
Staff Sergeant Benavidez could only hear what was going on around him. He had over thirty seven puncture wounds. His intestines were exposed.
He could not see as his eyes were caked in blood and unable to open. Neither could he speak, his jaw broken, clubbed by a North Vietnamese rifle. But he knew what was happening, and it was the scariest moment of his life, even more so than the earlier events of the day. He lay in a body bag, bathed in his own blood.
Jerry Cottingham, a friend screamed “That’s Benavidez. Get a doc”. When the doctor arrived he placed his hand on Roy’s chest to feel for a heartbeat. He pronounced him dead. The physician shook his head. *“There’s nothing I can do for him.” *As the doctor bent over to zip up the body bag. Benavidez did the only thing he could think of to let the doctor know that he was alive. He spit in the doctor’s face.
The surprised doctor reversed Roy’s condition from dead to “He won’t make it, but we’ll try”.
The 32-year-old son of a Texas sharecropper had just performed for six hours one of the most remarkable feats of the Vietnam War. Benavidez, part Yaqui Indian and part Mexican, was a seventh-grade dropout and an orphan who grew up taunted by the term “dumb Mexican.” But, as Ronald Reagan noted, if the story of what he accomplished was made into a movie, no one would believe it really happened.
Roy Benavidez’s ordeal began at Loc Ninh, a Green Beret outpost near the Cambodian border. It was 1:30 p.m., May 2, 1968. A chaplain was holding a prayer service around a jeep for the sergeant and several other soldiers. Suddenly, shouts rang out from a nearby short-wave radio. *“Get us out of here!” *someone screamed. *“For God’s sake, get us out!” *
A 12-man team consisting of Sergeant First Class Leroy Wright, Staff Sergeant Lloyd “Frenchie” Mousseau](http://www.psywarrior.com/frenchie.jpg), Specialist Four Brian O’Connor and nine Nung tribesmen monitoring enemy troop movements in the jungle had found itself surrounded by a North Vietnamese army battalion.
With out orders, Benavidez volunteered so quickly that he didn’t even bring his M-16 when he dashed for the helicopter preparing for a rescue attempt. The sole weapon he carried was a bowie knife on his belt.*“I’m coming with you,” *he told the three crew members.
Airborne, they spotted the soldiers in a tight circle. A few hundred enemy troops surrounded them in the jungle, some within 25 yards of the Americans’ position. The chopper dropped low, ran into withering fire and quickly retreated. Spotting a small clearing 75 yards away, Benavidez told the pilot, “Over there, over there.”
The helicopter reached the clearing and hovered 10 feet off the ground. Benavidez made the sign of the cross, jumped out carrying a medic bag and began running the 75 yards towards the trapped men.
Almost immediately, Benavidez was hit by an AK-47 slug in his right leg. He stumbled and fell, but got back up convincing himself that he’d only snagged a thorn bush and kept running to the brush pile where Wright’s men lay. An exploding hand grenade knocked him down and ripped his face with shrapnel. He shouted prayers, got up again and staggered to the men.
Four of the soldiers were dead, the other eight wounded and pinned down in two groups. Benavidez bound their wounds, injected morphine and, ignoring NVA bullets and grenades, passed around ammunition that he had taken from several bodies and armed himself with an AK.
Then Benavidez directed air strikes and called for the Huey helicopter to a landing near one group. While calling in support he was shot again in the right thigh, his second gunshot wound. He dragged the dead and wounded aboard.
The chopper lifted a few feet off the ground and moved toward the second group, with Benavidez running beneath it, firing a rifle he had picked up. He spotted the body of the team leader Sergeant First Class Wright. Ordering the other soldiers to crawl toward the chopper, he retrieved a pouch dangling from the dead man’s neck; in the pouch were classified papers with radio codes and call signs.
As he shoved the papers into his shirt, a bullet struck his stomach and a grenade shattered his back. The helicopter, barely off the ground, suddenly crashed, its pilot shot dead.
Coughing blood, Benavidez made his way to the Huey and pulled the wounded from the wreckage, forming a small perimeter. As he passed out ammunition taken from the dead, the air support he had earlier radioed for arrived. Jets and helicopter gunships strafed threatening enemy soldiers while Benavidez tended the wounded. “Are you hurt bad, Sarge?” one soldier asked. *“Hell, no,” *said Benavidez, about to collapse from blood loss. “I’ve been hit so many times I don’t give a damn no more.”
While mortar shells burst everywhere, Benavidez called in Phantoms “danger close”. Enemy fire raked the perimeter. Several of the wounded were hit again, including Benavidez. By this time he had blood streaming down his face, blinding him.
Still he called in air strikes, adjusting their targets by sound. Several times, pilots thought he was dead, but then his voice would come back on the radio, calling for closer strikes. Throughout the fighting, Benavidez, a devout Catholic, made the sign of the cross so many times, his arms were “were going like an airplane prop”. But he never gave into fear.
Finally, a helicopter landed. “Pray and move out,” Benavidez told the men as he helped each one aboard. As he carried a seriously wounded Frenchie Mousseau over his shoulder a fallen NVA soldier stood up, swung his rifle and clubbed Benavidez in the head.
Benavidez fell, rolled over and got up just as the soldier lunged forward with his bayonet. Benavidez grabbed it, slashing his right hand, and pulled his attacker toward him. With his left hand, he drew his own bowie knife and stabbed the NVA but not before the bayonet poked completely through his left forearm.
As Benavidez dragged Mousseau to the chopper, he saw two more NVA materialize out of the jungle. He snatched a fallen AK-47 rifle and shot both. Benavidez made one more trip to the clearing and came back with a Vietnamese interpreter. Only then did the sergeant let the others pull him aboard the helicopter.
Blood dripped from the door as the chopper lumbered into the air. Benavidez was holding in his intestines with his hand. Bleeding almost into unconsciousness, Benavidez lay against the badly wounded Mousseau and held his hand. Just before they landed at the Medevac hospital, “I felt his fingers dig into my palm,” Benavidez recalled, “his arm twitching and jumping as if electric current was pouring through his body into mine”
At Loc Ninh, Benavidez was so immobile they placed him with the dead. Even after he spit in the doctor’s face and was taken from the body bag, Benavidez was considered a goner.
Benavidez spent almost a year in hospitals to recover from his injuries. He had seven major gunshot wounds, twenty-eight shrapnel holes and both arms had been slashed by a bayonet. Benavidez had shrapnel in his head, scalp, shoulder, buttocks, feet, and legs. His right lung was destroyed. He had injuries to his mouth and back of his head from being clubbed with a rifle butt. One of the AK-47 bullets had entered his back exiting just beneath his heart.
He had won the battle and lived. When told his one man battle was awesome and extraordinary, Benavidez replied: “No, that’s duty.”
Wright and Mousseau were each awarded the Distinguish Service Cross posthumously.
Although Master Sergeant Benavidez’s commander felt that he deserved the Congressional Medal of Honor for his valor in saving eight lives, he put Roy in for the Distinguished Service Cross.
The process for awarding a Medal of Honor would have taken much longer, and he was sure Benavidez would die before he got it. The recommendation for the Distinguish Service Cross was rushed through approval channels and Master Sergeant Benavidez was presented the award by General William C. Westmoreland while he was recovering from his wounds at Fort Sam Houston’s Hospital.
Years later, his former commander learned that Benavidez had survived the war. The officer also learned more details of the sergeant’s mission and concluded that Benavidez merited a higher honor.
Years of red tape followed until finally on February 24, 1981, President Reagan told White House reporters “you are going to hear something you would not believe if it were a script.” Reagan then read Roy Benavidez’s Citation for the Medal of Honor.
Benavidez however, did not regard himself as a hero. He said of his actions. *“The real heroes are the ones who gave their lives for their country, I don’t like to be called a hero. I just did what I was trained to do.” *
In addition to being a recipient of the Medal Of Honor, MSG Benavidez was the recipient of the Combat Infantry Badge for his Viet Nam war service, the Purple Heart Medal with 4 Oak Leaf Clusters, Viet Nam Campaign Medal with 4 Battle Stars, Viet Nam Service Medal, Air Medal, Master Parachutist Badge, Vietnamese Parachutist Badge, Republic of Viet Nam Cross of Gallantry with Palm, and other numerous decorations.
Upon retirement Master Sergeant Benavidez lived in El Campo, Texas, with his wife, Lala, and three children, Noel,Yvette and Denise. He was a member of the: Medal of Honor Society, Legion of Valor, Veterans of Foreign War, Special Operations Association, Alamo Silver Wings Airborne Association, and Special Forces Association, The 82nd Airborne Association,West Point Honorary Alumni Association, and countless other organizations.
**Roy P. Benavidez ** Elementary School Houston, Texas
Master Sergeant Roy Benavidez died on November 29, 1998. Over 1,500 people attended his funeral to say goodbye.
He is buried in the shade of a live oak tree at the Fort Sam Houston National Cementery, a fitting final resting place for someone who gave so much of himself to this great nation.
In addition to his heroic actions in combat, he will also be remembered for his work with youths. He spoke at schools and colleges and even runaway shelters. He promoted patriotism, staying-in school, encouraged continuing education, and drug free programs for students. Vision Quest, an organization known for working with problem youths, named a youth boot camp Fort Roy P. Benavidez in Uvalde, Texas after him.
Master Sergeant Benavidez was further recognized by the naming of the Roy P. Benavidez Elementary School in Houston, Texas.
In August 1999, the U.S. Army dedicated the $14 million Master Sergeant Roy P. Benavidez Special Operations Logistics Complex at Fort Bragg, NC.
On September 14, 2000, the U.S. Navy Secretary Richard Danzig announced that the U.S. Navy plans to name a new ship after Master Sergeant Roy P. Benavidez. The ship, scheduled to be christened next summer as the USNS Benavidez, will be the seventh in a class of large, medium speed roll-on/roll-off sealift ships. Army Secretary Louis Caldera made these remarks on the Navy’s announcement:"Master Sergeant Roy Benavidez was a true American hero, rising from humble origins in South Texas to become an Army legen. Wounded over 40 times as he saved the lives of eight fellow soldiers under heavy fire in Vietnam, he always said he was only doing his duty to his fellow soldiers and to the country he loved. The Navy’s recognition of his selfless service is truly an appropriate tribute to Master Sgt. Benavidez’s memory, and to the ideals of our nation that he epitomized."
If you would like to learn more about Master Sergeant Roy Benavidez’s life, before, during and after the Vietnam War, then I recommend that you visit the (Roy Benavidez's papers donated to Center for American History) at The University of Texas.
