Redbelly wrote:I have always been in awe of the balls it took to run on a beach with machine guns blazing at you. I have been very lucky not to have had to go to war anywhere.
Redbelly, it's not "the balls", it's the training you go through and the mindset that you develop during training with a group of guys that "you are not going to let your buddy down"! I used to be in awe of things like amphibious landings, gunfire, mortars, cannon shells, getting killed, etc. My father was an old Navy chief from WWII - North Atlantic Convoy duty on a Minesweeper - and he warned me not to get mixed up with the Marine Corps, too.
Well, one day in 1970, I found myself out in the middle of the Gulf of Tonkin, on what we called Yankee Station (off North Vietnam waters), on board the aircraft carrier USS Kitty Hawk, as hospital corpsman, on the flight deck watch, with countless numbers of 500# and 1,000# bombs, missiles, and other ordinance passing by my "aid station" during what the Airedales called an "Alpha Strike". My corpsman partner was a more seasoned veteran than I, so I did what he was doing...standing around looking for accidents to happen!
One bomb or missile going off or one plane crashing on deck and...well, that's why we trained for "damage control". It sort of put death on the beach landings and various kinds of gunfire in it's proper prospective...the one that gets you is the one you will never hear coming!
Later on, I defied my father's wishes and hooked up with the USMC - I never had more fun in the service than with those guys.
Let us all take a moment this morning and pay humble respects to those servicemen that gave their "last full measure" for our freedom 63 years ago on the beaches of Normandy, France! They, my friends, are the real hero's...especially, those that did not come home as any WWII veteran will tell you! 
! Without those sacrifices, we would not be here today enjoying our freedom to fish and exist - history is the great teacher! 
It saddens me to think that some of the soldiers that survived that "hell on earth" of yesteryear will finally pass on to join their "brothers", who perished so long ago. Those of you out there that are veterans of one war or another can fully understand what I mean! 
