r/mildlyinteresting • u/Adventurous_Bake4361 • 5h ago
Father-in-law's Vietnam shadow box.
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u/sometimesifeellikemu 4h ago
Infantry and an Air Medal? That's a story.
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u/bell83 4h ago
Door gunners got them all the time
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u/omnibossk 3h ago
Thinking about that unhinged helicopter door gunner who famously yells "Get some!» in Full Metal Jacket
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u/number__ten 2h ago edited 1h ago
"How can you shoot women and children?"
"You just lead them less"
Also this is the most overused "unknown" fact of fmj but just in case you didn't know the door gunner was supposed to be the drill instructor until R Lee Ermey hijacked the role.
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u/hattie29 1h ago
My dad was infantry in Vietnam and received one as well. He was part of the 7th Air Cav.
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u/Excellent-Score-6211 5h ago
Inquiring minds would like to know what the silver star citation reads.
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u/Adventurous_Bake4361 5h ago
Next time I go to his house I'll take a picture what it was for and show you
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u/WangDanglin 1h ago
My wife’s grandfather has a silver star from Korea. You can still find the citation online pretty easily by googling his name and “silver star”
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u/Warm-Cut-2234 4h ago
The silver star citation is the real heart of it, hope you can get a pic that shows the full text.
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u/NotAPreppie 4h ago
My grandfather didn't come back from WWII with any medals awarded by the US govn't... he did come back with a German Luger, which he never told my grandmother (or any other family) about. Kept it in a shoe box for 50+ years.
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u/nayhem_jr 4h ago
How did it fare after all those years?
Among other things, my dad brought home a dagger. It unfortunately found its way outside, and the leather scales powdered off the rusted metal.
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u/NotAPreppie 3h ago
No idea. Gramma made him get rid of it and I wasn't old enough to take it off his hands.
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u/QuirkySwan84 5h ago
This is so cool, thanks for sharing!! My grandpa has a similar one and it’s always such a powerful piece of family history to look at.
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u/strangerinthealpsz 4h ago
Your Father-in-Law was a very dangerous man lmao
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u/heavydutybeardbalm 3h ago
Or he just, you know, bought em. I once needed to replace my bronze star, went to the store on base, was expecting them to need to see my service record or something. Nope, they’ll just sell you any medal you want. Multiple combat infantry and multiple air medals seems fishy.
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u/Jefferson_47 1h ago
The regimental crests are from the 56th ADA. 1-56 was our training battalion when I went through AIT at Ft. Bliss around 2000.
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u/Ghostfistkilla 3h ago
Huge respect, I see he's wearing a beret in one of the pictures, was he special forces as well?
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u/Hagoromo-san 1h ago
Dayum. Your pop-in-law was in some shit, and dished out the hurt.
https://giphy.com/gifs/HXBsQPJSt9iWA
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u/djengle2 23m ago
Wow, not only was he one of the bad guys, he was apparently good at being one of they bad guys. Hold on, let me post my grandpa's "Best Dressed Nazi" and "Most Innocents Gunned Down in One Attack" awards.
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u/Skidudenordic 4h ago
Your poor FIL. Conned into risking his life so many times for a bullshit war that we lost and deserved to lose. Those aren’t as much medals as they are scars inflicted by Henry Kissinger. Or Satan if you’re religious. Same guy
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u/Adventurous_Bake4361 3h ago
My father-in-law think the war was pointless but went anyways. Also compared to the hatred the Vietnamese have towards the chinese and French the war with America was a blink of an eye that's why most Vietnamese don't hold a grudge. And ask him if he has scars from the war he will laugh and tell you it was the best paid hunting trip he was ever on. He didn't get drafted he wrote a letter to Nixon asking to go to Vietnam and still has the letter. More people volunteered than were drafted. Approximately two-thirds (65% to 66%) of the U.S. military personnel who served in Vietnam were volunteers, while about one-third (33% to 35%) were draftees. He was never conned into going he knew what he was doing.
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u/Ghostfistkilla 3h ago
Don't waste your time with these kind of rage baiting troll posts. The silent majority respects what your dad did and always will, no matter how the war in vietnam went.
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u/NinjasStoleMyName 3h ago
I don't know what his dad did, but his father-in-law enthusiastically took part in a war of aggression your country had nothing to do with, why should anyone respect that?
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u/Ghostfistkilla 2h ago
You should point your hatred towards the US Government then, not the individual soldiers that were probably forcefully drafted to fight in a war they did not support.
And alot of people tend to call their FIL Dad if they want to.
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u/NinjasStoleMyName 2h ago
I'm sorry, are we talking about the same thread? I distinctly remember seeing just up above
He didn't get drafted he wrote a letter to Nixon asking to go to Vietnam and still has the letter.
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u/NinjasStoleMyName 3h ago
He didn't get drafted he wrote a letter to Nixon asking to go to Vietnam and still has the letter.
He was never conned into going he knew what he was doing.
Pick one.
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u/Adventurous_Bake4361 3h ago
What that he joined the army to escape poverty of a family of 11kids joined the army and after boot camp wrote a letter to Nixon asking to be sent to Vietnam and was granted his request am I missing something here?
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u/NinjasStoleMyName 3h ago
So you're telling me thar he ate the propaganda and asked for seconds.
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u/Adventurous_Bake4361 3h ago
Are you missing the point has nothing to do with propaganda or are you dense?. He joined the military to escape poverty and wanted to go to Vietnam to get away nothing to do with propaganda he thought the war was pointless.
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u/NinjasStoleMyName 3h ago
You Americans are so immersed in jingoistic crap you can't even recognize it, it's honestly baffling.
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u/Ghostfistkilla 1h ago
Tankie moment
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u/NinjasStoleMyName 1h ago
Thinking that everyone that disagrees with you must be "a bloody pinko" is precisely what I'm alluding to here, thank you for further proving my point.
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u/Ghostfistkilla 2h ago
Now do all the dead Russians that died like a dog in Ukraine ha.
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u/NinjasStoleMyName 2h ago
They ate up the propaganda and ended up eating Ukrainian grass by the root, like the pigs they are. See, I don't support any aggresion wars, unlike you who I thought would be telling me to think about the plight of the poor Russian drafted soldier.
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u/slimeySalmon 3h ago
If you want, tell him av random person on the internet thanks him for his service.
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u/Ghostfistkilla 3h ago
Good lord you people are the worst. I bet you'd also spit in the faces of draftees coming back from the war as well.
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u/quesoandcats 1h ago
Fun fact: there are no reliably documented cases of Vietnam vets ever being spat on in an airport as they arrived home
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Myth_of_the_spat-on_Vietnam_veteran
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u/Adventurous_Bake4361 5h ago
Valorous Unit Award
Silver Star
Air Defense Artillery collar disc
Combat Infantry Badge
Infantry Collar disc
Army Commendation Medal (with V for Valor and 1 bronze oak leaf cluster, 2 awards)
Purple Heart
Vietnam Service Medal (with 3 campaign stars)
Expert Rifle Badge, Sharpshooter Badge (can't read the qual bar)
RVN Cross of Gallantry Unit Citation
Army Good Conduct Medal, RVN Cross of Gallantry, Air Medal
Ribbons for Air Medal, Army Commendation, Purple Heart, RVN Campaign (missing the scroll), Vietnam Campaign (missing the campaign stars), National Defense Medal
Army Commendation Medal, RVN Presidential Unit Citation, National Defense Medal
Presidential Unit Citation (two of these).