Interview with John Morris

Morris, John ; McKiernan, Stephen

John Morris, a native of Downingtown, PA, joined the Army Security Agency in 1965 and served two years in Vietnam. Following Vietnam, he was stationed at Fort Wolters, Texas, to train other operators in route to Vietnam until 1969. John Morris is a life member and active with the Vietnam Veterans of America. He is also a life member of the Veterans of Foreign War and the Disabled American Veterans. He received the Chapel of the Four Chaplain’s Legion of Honor Award.

2003-11-25

In copyright

2018-03-29

McKiernan Interviews

230:02

McKiernan Interviews
Interview with: John Morris
Interviewed by: Stephen McKiernan
Transcriber: REV
Date of interview: 20 November 2003
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(Start of Interview)

SM:
And yeah, I tested this beforehand. When you think of the (19)60s and the early (19)70s and when you were young, what is the first thing that comes to your mind when you think of that period?

JM:
With the question? I will answer the draft. Okay. The draft was something that was always there hanging over my head from the time I left high school until the time I was finally drafted. And it sort of controlled a lot of things that happened to me. For example, it was hard to get a job because you might get drafted. It was hard to start a relationship because you might get drafted. So that would be the first thing to come to my mind. The draft itself.

SM:
Do you think that was also on the minds of many of your peers?

JM:
No, absolutely.

SM:
In terms of their futures?

JM:
Well, and of course back in those days a lot of guys forced their way into college just to stay out from under the draft for some period of time, just to get some relief from it because it is always there. And you always knew who was being drafted that week or that month and where you stood in line to be drafted. How many months did you have before it would be your turn?

SM:
Do you remember what your number was?

JM:
Oh, I was before numbers.

SM:
Oh, you were before the numbers.

JM:
Before the numbers, yeah.

SM:
Okay.

JM:
Numbers were for wimps. Come On.

SM:
Okay, well, I remember the numbers.

JM:
Yeah, no, I was in the service when the number thing started.

SM:
One of the things about the boomer generation, which is often defined as individuals born between (19)46 and (19)64, some people say there are people born between (19)42 and 1960, give or take a couple years. But when you look at the boomer generation, in recent years there has been a lot of criticism of this generation of 70 million for the breakdown of some of the values in our society and our culture. And I would like your thoughts on people who make those kinds of comments on that particular generation. And of course they are making comments on the drugs and a lot of different things.

JM:
They are mostly right. We were the most pampered generation up to our time. Our parents, who we now refer to as the greatest generation, fought a war and depression and did not have any of the benefits we have and gave them to us. And we turned around and acted as though they were some sort of birthright. So we, the group that you are referring to, the boomers, of which I am a point man since I was born in (19)45, we were spoiled. We really were. We did not know about hunger. We did not know what it meant to have to get up and help around the farm and things like that. And in a sense, we probably had it too easy and drugs became a passage for us. Most people of my age smoked marijuana, perhaps just things that were quite a bit harder. I believe we almost all drank. So we were out for a good time and we were not very mature. So yes, they were right.

SM:
Do you think a lot of this stuff has been passed on to their children? Because right now what you are seeing on college campuses and all over America is the children of boomers have been in college for a lot of years. Now we are starting to see the very beginning of grandchildren of boomers coming, although it is still mostly the children of boomers. What sort of an influence do you feel that they have had on their children in terms of not only these issues dealing with our culture, but involvement in caring about America, but most involvement in voting and things like that?

JM:
Well, I am probably one of the luckiest people. My children are great. They have turned into two very sparkling young adults. So I can only speak from a very narrow point of view and I am lucky in that their friends also fall into that category. So I see mostly the good of the younger generation. And I think that is mostly the majority of the younger generation. And this newer crowd seems far more levelheaded than that X generation that came between the boomers and the new generation. And this newer crowd is, I will say from 18 through 25, seem to have their act together at a very young age. I am encouraged, but also, again, I see a very small segment of that grouping.

SM:
It is always hard to generalize an entire generation of 70 million. But I think the individuals that have been making these comments over the years have been people like George Will. And he always likes to get a jab at the Boomers whenever he can. I know Newt Gingrich had his time when he made commentaries, yet he was a boomer himself.

JM:
Yeah.

SM:
So there is a lot of thoughts on this particular thing. Have you changed at all in terms of your thoughts on the boomers over time? What were your thoughts of your generation at the time you were young and here it is now, believe it or not, 30 plus years hence. Have you changed your opinions on your generation over time or are they still the same?

JM:
Well, at the time when we were younger, say high school, mostly what I feel we felt was pressure. We looked at our parents as our role models, promptly decided that was not who we wanted to be and yet did not know how to go out and forge a new way. And we did find a way that we may call those the (19)60s, especially the late (19)60s. I think we turned everything upside down during this period of time looking for a way to become anything other than our parents. Now, looking back on that, that was again part of our selfishness. We decided we had to make our mark. And even today I think we are still doing that same thing because we are changing healthcare, we are changing retirement, all the other things. And I guess it is because of the great numbers that we have and you move that many people around, things change. Especially if they wanted them to change.

SM:
All right. That leads into something about one of the most unique things about the generation is its size. There has never been anything like it before, whether 65 to 70 million is the count most people give to the generation. Is there anything that is unique to this generation beyond its size? Because obviously its size stands out.

JM:
Yeah, selfishness there, both individually and collectively. And I say that and I put myself in that category. I was selfish. I still look at everything and think how does it affect me? How's the best going to be in my favor? Things like that. And I think that is be part and parcel of being a boomer. Yes. Other people are that way who are not boomers, but I think we pretty much set the stage for that or gave them the role model. But again, selfishness.

SM:
Thing is, a lot of the people our age and boomers as a whole used to always say amongst themselves when they are young that we are the most feeling, that we are the most unique generation in history because we are going to be the change agents for the betterment of society. We are going to end racism, sexism, homophobia. We are going to end war, we are going to have peace, help the poor, and all these other things. Well, if selfishness in your thought is number one, what happened? Because a lot of the people got involved in the causes to help others.

JM:
And I think they got disillusioned because they had a very low threshold for that sort of thing, that they could not get instant results through gratification. They just moved along. That is not to demean those folks that stayed in it for the long run. More credit to them. But going back to your question, yeah, well, we wanted to change all those things and we have not done a whole lot of good about it. And those things still exist today and probably will for far too long a period of time.

SM:
Looking at the generation now and kind of looking at characteristics, both positive, negative, if you were to list, and you have already talked about selfishness, but if you are going to list some of the negatives and some of the positives, what would they be?

JM:
I think part and parcel we are a very creative generation. I think a lot of the inventions we now take for granted came from our generation. That is definitely a positive. I think we had a work ethic taught to us by our parents that we continued. I think we picked some of the good out of the greatest generation and kept it going forward. That is one of them. The negative thing would be, I am not really certain there is a large number of us who are active in controlling our governments, both in the local and national levels. I think the ones that are in that are the ones that would have always been political, whatever generation they were born to. A large number of us get apathetic about things. It is that old fa-

JM:
Large number as get apathetic about things. It is that whole thing again, we wanted to make such a change in the world, at least in our country. And then when it could not happen, we thought, What the heck. Cannot be done? If we cannot do it this generation, then it just cannot be done. And we became that apathetic. It has been a fun group to be involved with. I think humor has been cranked up quite a bit since we took over the reins. I think industry and commerce and all business has changed quite a bit simply because we were in there now pulling the strings. We were the power seats. We were the guys in their (19)50s that are controlling everything. And I think for the betterment of business everywhere. And I think some of the things you see in today's workforce that were not there 30 years ago are there because boomers put them there. We were the guys that put in the baby nursery rooms for people of schools. I think were the ones that probably cranked up the healthcare coverage. These are things I do not think you went to work and expected back in 1965.

SM:
Of course your main negative one was the selfishness aspects. Do you think the generation X, the generation of now, were equally selfish?

JM:
I think they might have even been more selfish, but they were also... What is the word I am looking for? I think they played angst too much. They wanted to be un-understood, not understood, and they made that their mask. So the selfishness was inner and was in focus and they did not want you to know who they were.

SM:
Peter Mack was a Painter of that area. He is actually still doing paintings. He is a multi-millionaire now. But back then he was up and coming and struggling and then very successful Artist. He had a painting with words that said, You do your thing, I will do mine. If by chance we should come together, it will be beautiful. Your thoughts on that in reference to the boomer generation and the youth of the (19)60s and (19)70s? Because I put them together. Okay.

JM:
Well, the phraseology you used sounds very (19)60s, does not it? Do your thing, I will do mine. Come together like The Beatles. Well, first thing I hear in there is this overwhelming granting of permission. I am going to let you go ahead and do whatever you want. I am expecting that in return. I am expecting you to grant me the same permission. That is a nice overall way to explain what I think this boomer generation wanted. They wanted to do what they wanted to do and they wanted other people to feel free to do it. And I think the last part of that is a great phrase because if you come together, it is even better. But it is very difficult to go do your thing and then not conflict with other people doing their thing. Example might be, I want to have children, but I do not want to get married. What a burden that puts on society. That is the selfishness I was talking about. And bumping it up a generation, I think that phrase probably would have stuck in their throats. They probably would have said that is my mom and dad's thing. I do not want any part of that. They wanted to be left alone. I do not think necessarily they even thought about their own thing in doing it. Might be way off base, but that is just what I would say.

SM:
John, when you think of that period, is there any one movement that stands out above all others? And I mean, we are talking about a generation that saw so many movements, the civil rights movement, the anti-war movement, the women's movement, gay and lesbian, the Chicano, the Native American, they all seem to be together. But was there one movement that you feel stood out amongst everything else that when you talk about the (19)60s generation and the boomers, that is the movement?

JM:
Well, as you asked that question, what came to my mind was the sports industry. Back in the (19)60s, we all lived for the World Series, sports athletes were heroes to us. It has changed so much in the past 35, 40 years that I do not recognize it anymore. And I think what they have done is we still put these people up on pedestals and then we try to follow their example. And that is where I think we get a little off. And as you were saying that the first thing that, like I said, just went right to the front of my mind is sports world. I know they do not have a whole lot of effect on our society, but they have changed quite a bit. I am very disappointed in what they have done. I used to be a great fan of all sports. I hardly watch anything anymore. I cannot put up with it.

SM:
Do you think that what has happened to your thoughts and what has happened to the athlete is a symptom of, again, a generation which covers the (19)60s and the (19)70s of people who, because they did not trust leaders and they saw so many things that they were disappointed in that, they have even got to find something wrong when something is right, even in an athlete? That no athlete can be pure and clean anymore. You have always got to find something negative on a person. Is there something there on that?

JM:
That is a good point. Back in the (19)60s, they used to hide these things about athletes. I mean, look like Mickey Mantle is an example. I had all night party and drinking hard and waking up from a drunken stupid to go four for four. And we did not know about that. Yeah, it was not until you told us, he got out. But now today, let us use Darryl Strawberry is an example, we knew his every movement. If he did not come to practice that day, we knew about him. And yesterday it was easy to find fault with a guy like that. Whereas we still idolized Mickey Mantle. And I think that what I was trying to find is the gist of your question is how fair has that been, it is our view of these athletes. Yes, they are like the poster child for the people that are in it for themselves. And it is probably been the way it has always been with sports, but it has changed so much. I can remember when the local sports teams in Philadelphia would not play Wilt Chamberlain a hundred thousand dollars a year and now they are paying guys like that that kind of money a game.

SM:
And the minimum for a rookie, I think is a quarter million or something like that today, if you sit on the bench and get to bat 40 times. Amazing. Getting back to the movements, I want to get back to the anti-war movement in America and what was happening on the college campuses. How important, in your opinion as a veteran, because you are coming from a different perspective here than maybe some other people I have interviewed, how important do you feel the anti-war movement was on college campuses over the (19)60s and early (19)70s in ending that war?

JM:
Well, it sure got a lot of press. From the time I can remember, maybe I should give you a little background here. When I went to Vietnam, that was 1966, there was hardly any type of protest anywhere against the war. I got back in (19)67 and that was just starting the White Heat of the protest movement. So I went from nothing to intensity within a short period of time, pan of year, not knowing anything. That information was not given to us over there. We heard about it from the new guys coming in. So I think what they did, they got a lot of press. The newspapers and TV people loved them. So they got up there a lot. And I think they bumped the service people off of the stage. And I think they behaved, my word is childishly, is that right? They behave like children and they wanted to spotlight. And in the long run, I do not want to cast this aspersions to anybody's beliefs, but I think a lot of them were just in it for the fun, for what they think they could do. It might have been that part of their lives where they thought they could make a change. And were trying very hard. And I think they cluttered up as they clogged up the works, in my opinion. And then the final question was, do I think they helped bring me in into war? I think what they did was they made it sound as though their opinion was so prevalent throughout the United States that it was the common opinion. And I think Nixon being the consummate politician he was, decided to bring war to some form of an end, his peace with honor to get it behind us. I think he probably saw that along with his cohorts, that America was not going to go anywhere as long as the war was going on and people were still protesting it. So in a sense, yeah, they did. I think they may have prolonged the war is another aspect because if we had have been able to go in and do what we needed to do militarily, we would not have been there until (19)72.

SM:
All right. When you are talking about the anti-war movement, again, could you give me a little bit about your background when you went to school, high school and how right out... If you had college or you went right into the military, just a little bit of that background and the years.

JM:
Graduated in (19)63. Bishop Shanahan just had our College Reunion this past Saturday, and went to work. I did not go to college. And there is that drafting again. So (19)63 through November of (19)65, I was under the cloud of the draft. Went to work here in West Chester near the college. Now I will think about it, I did not pick up on anything anti-war moves. I did not pick up on any student activities one way or the other. Well, I worked in West Chester at Mosteller, the old department store. Left that in 1965 to start my own business. And I started out in dining town and became oblivious to everything else that was going on in my life. I was not married, I was starting a business. I was working 16, 18 hours a day. I was not reading the paper, I was not watching television. I do not know what was going on. Anything I cared about was where am I in the draft. So long behold or round about September, October, I knew my number was going to be up. So I looked for alternative ways to do my service. And most of those doors were slammed shut. There was no openings in the National Guard or the reserves. Getting into the Navy was difficult. Air Force was almost impossible. And for some reason I could still never explain even to myself, I joined the Army to avoid getting drafted.

SM:
I heard that before, but-

JM:
I joined the Army to avoid being drafted. I signed up for four years where I could have got out in two of being drafted. Now if you ever want an example of a bad decision, that was it. My time spent in the military till November of (19)66 was in training. No contact or no attitude or anything like that about anybody else who was doing anything else. The college kids, other people of my generation. Drafted to go in November 29th, which was my birthday. I thought that was cruel that the government could do that to me. Joined on the 17th of November and November 17th, 1966, left Boston for Vietnam. Stayed over there till November of (19)67. Came back here. And now looking back on it, I was going into a world I did not know. We were told not to pick fights with civilians when we got off the plane. I am thinking, nobody ever said that to me before. Why would I pick a fight with a civilian? We did not know. The big thing then, Steve, was the mini-skirt. Oh yeah. Okay. All right.

SM:
I remember that.

JM:
We were all anxious to get home and see these mini-skirt things. And we were in the airport at 3:00 in the morning, there was not much going on. There was Austin, there was a group of other people. And probably for the first time I encountered that coldness that people of my own age had towards the military. When you are just hanging out, there is people your age. You gravitate together. Well, as I gravitated towards them, they gravitated away from me. They did not want [inaudible]. When I finally got that through my sleepy head, I just walked away. That was my first in contact with that sort of thing. And on the way home, I encountered another one time, right here in West Chester. And I just pretty much said, They were a bunch of jerks, and went home. So that was my background. Now it was November, 1967. The summer of love is over and the demonstrations, the protests are starting to really heat up. And I am looking around saying, Did I do something wrong? And some people bother to tell me that yes I did. By agreeing to go in over there, I was branded a coward by people.

SM:
Could you explain again, just your thoughts on those moments when you were on that plane flying to Vietnam and when you were on that plane returning from Vietnam?

JM:
A little background, I did not go over on plane. I went on a boat, ship. That took, I think 11 days. Mostly what that was, the whole time spent was we were apprehensive. They tried to fill our days in with the DS classes and things like that. [inaudible], Jalapeno gun for the thousand time in your life. They try to do that, but the whole time all you know is you are going to Vietnam. And they tried to keep it... What is the word I am looking for? Not somber. Professional. There was no partying. Nobody was in the mood to party. The night before we landed in Vietnam, they let the marines land by letting them crawl down those ladders they put down the side and into those sand pants and take them off to the beach. And we are watching these guys and often the distance, we can see the flashing lights, what we assume were some mortar rounds, bullets, whatever. And we are watching these guys going in there and we are just saying, poor some of bitches, man. They are drawing into the heat of the... They are going at night. How smart is that? And then we got Marines. He expected. So next day it was our turn. And rather than climbing down rope ladders, they just had some kind of gang wave for us to walk down. We just walked with our stuff and we were not Marines. So I had our stuff, which is double bags, rifles, whatever else we had on us. And we got into the same sand pants and we were hardhats when we were in gear, we had all our gear on and we were riding to the shore to where they were going to let us out. And all I am thinking about are those movies I have seen where they were sitting in those metal targets and this big thing goes dropping down like that. And there was this Major standing there taking pictures. And I thought how could it be. So we just drug our shit out of there. And he was just there, just taking pictures. And he directed us to some people who told us where we needed to go. And that was the way over. Now, the way back, that was quite a bit different story. I have written an article about this one. They lined us up on the tarmac and they put us alphabetically. So I was able to tell a guy who had been ragging me for a year to put my time in, to put his time in, because I was M and he was S. So it was, put your time in. I was leaving Vietnam before. So we got into the Continental Airlines. I cannot forget. First Miniskirt. First mini skirt on a regular American girl, because we had entertainers over there and they wore the miniskirts on purpose. First American girl with the miniskirt. So we got into the plane and we were sitting there and there is this feeling you get, it was almost like, okay, move this effing plane. And you feel the runway. You feel it running down the runway, I should say. Just as the wheels lift, you get that weightless feeling. Just as they lifted, the plane went nuts. We all started cheering and slapping fires, all that stuff like that. And the plane took off and it settled down for five minutes later. Guys did not know each other. We were just congratulating to each other. Things like that. And it was wonderful on our way home. Plane had not cleared space yet, we were not going to wait to party. We were on the air off the ground, We were an American territory now. And I will never forget this, the Crown Royal comes in that blue bag, purple bag. This old guy got up there. He was like [inaudible], and he said, Would anybody like to drink? And he held up, and of course we went, Whoa, yeah. He says, I got one thing to ask you, is do not drink, I got a toast. And okay, so we passed on little plastic cups. Rule was, and they told us this, if you open a bottle, it must be finished before the plane lands. Yeah, you can have your alcohol, but if you open the bottle, it has got to be finished. You cannot walk off a plane with a bottle with booze in. So that bottle was going down. So we all got our cups, and the sole guy, he says, I do not know any of you guys on this plane. I just got one thing to say to you. And that old Sergeant Gruff, he says, Well done. And then, hear-hear. These Stewards came by and says, Would anybody else like a drink? Yeah, mama over here.

SM:
Yeah, my friend is going to move his seat so that your miniskirts can down.

JM:
And he woke us up about every three hours to eat. I will never forget that.

SM:
And how many hours to get back from Austin? 22? It is a real long flight.

JM:
It was 24 hours total. So part of that was spent in a wide waiting, which was the hard part. The hard part, meaning there were guys who were getting off the plane to meet their... Guys on R and R. That was where they were going. They were going to pick up other flights to go to other places. I was going to stay on the flight to San Francisco and people got off were Military, and the people who got on were civilians. And all of a sudden we were contagious. We got the looks that leave us alone. Can you be more quiet please? Type of attitude. That was the first of that I encountered anywhere that, oh my God, I have to sit with soldiers, type of attitude. And they were rather snotty about it.

SM:
These are all ages, these people?

JM:
All ages. Yeah. Forgive them now, probably guys who were in World War II. I do not know if it was just that group of people who knows who they were. They were going back to America and they had to suffer in a ride with a bunch of returning Soldiers. But it got better. It got better because the plane I picked up in San Francisco and flew into Chicago. I was sitting back in what we call coach now, that was second class, but those days, and the Steward just came up to me and said, Come with me please. I thought, yeah. What do you have in my mom? Right after the first class, first seat on the right-hand side on the aisle, she had, The Captain instructed me to put you here. You have been upgraded, because I was new.

SM:
That is wow.

JM:
And I sat next to a guy who was a Korean War veteran, and we talked the whole way over. And he was not a snot, he was one of the good guys. And we talked and I told him I did not do combat. I said, I almost used that as a sort of, “Hi, my name is John Morris. I did not do any combat. First thing I wanted you to know about me.” And we talked. And it was nice. Of course, you did not buy any drinks. The Stewards just came by and talked all the time to me. It was nice.

SM:
And that was a long flight.

JM:
Sam says it was a Chicago. Chicago got a little uglier in that. That is a hard airport. The ride back was great highs and great lows, followed by great highs and then great lows. Chicago was one of the great lows. Get to your plane, remembering the admonition. Do not pick any fights. Hang together. Military guys were clustering together. That is what would happen. Probably the only time I can remember that guys like Marines, Navy, Air Force would get together on purpose. Usually you break off into your own little groups, but we sit with Marines and Airmen, Sailors and all that stuff.

SM:
I remember my dad in World War II when he was in Japan two weeks after they dropped the bomb and they were told to be together because if they went individually, they would probably be dead. Getting back to some general questions here, I want your thoughts again about the boomers. The thought was that they were going to change the world. A lot of people thought they were going to change the world. There has been a lot of good things that have happened since they have... Hopefully we still have problems with race relations, but there has been a lot of laws passed on outlawing segregation. There has been quite a few positive things from respect to women's and women's equality in the United States and so forth, but just overall was that hubris on the part of the boomers that were going to change the world, that were going to be different or that were going to be the greatest generation, and in the history of this place, there will be no group ever like us?

JM:
Yeah, you make a good point. A lot of the things that we see now has improvement since we took over, things happened because we changed them. There are a lot of things now, although the women's rights movement is a good example. Women are now equal to men, as in some areas it did not happen for a long time, in the employment world, for example. The idea of a woman owning a company back in 1960 was unusual using that woman inherited it from her father. Today it is common. And we applaud women who step forward and take roles in industry and politics and things like that. And it is okay for them to still want to be mommies. And I think that is a great change that this generation has made that, Go back to Peter or Max, do your own thing.

SM:
Yes. I am trying to ask veterans their thoughts on the Nurses, the women who served there with the men. John, could you explain how the Vietnam vets looked at the women who were over in Vietnam? What were their thoughts?

JM:
Well, I never encountered a Nurse the whole time I was over there. Does that help you any?

SM:
Yeah. Or women in any other positions, whether they be like the services I mentioned earlier, or people in civilian positions, or the Donut Dollies. There were a lot of women in different roles and not just Nurses in the medical area.

JM:
I ran across civilian women in two categories, Donut Dollies, who were wonderful women. And for the most part they were not attractive women. And it is probably not a nice thing to say, but they were not the decent ones I met. But they were just common American women who wanted to do something. They came over from America to Vietnam to hand out the donuts, to talk to the soldiers. And they were always very nice. They would always very nice of us. They would serve us chow, which was a surprise when you went into the chow line because there you were covered in mud. Chances are good. You had those metal eating things and messier that we had. You did not expect to look up and see a woman of any caliber standing. It is like, ugh. The ones I had met always made it a point to call you Mr. Morris. Not specialist or private. Mr. Morris. And I always thought that was a nice touch because they brought you back home. You were not a private, you were not a number anymore. This nice lady was calling you Mr. And then you say, Well, call me John.

SM:
One of the things about the Vietnam Memorial in Washington DC is that the wall was built to help with the healing process for the Vietnam veterans and their families, and certainly to heal a nation. Anybody who have read Jan Scruggs book knows it was supposed to be a non-political entity. It is to heal and to pay tribute to those who served, those who were wounded in the families and so forth. To heal. I like your thoughts on where are the Vietnam veterans, just in your thoughts in terms of obviously the healing, how important that wall is toward the healing and had the divisions that were so strong at that period between those who were against the war and the people who served, has there been any healing with respect to those two groups?

JM:
Let me start with that one. When you had the wall here, that is probably the most dramatic example of what you are just talking about. As you might remember, we had a bunch of guys who were bent out of shape about some of the problems you had with that. The political problems. The guys I encountered that put me off were the guys who seemed to be expecting me to agree with them that what they did was, and the only thing I could say is, Well, if you did the right thing, if that is what you thought at the time was right, I am not going to say it was wrong. But they wanted me to say what they did was right and say, Well, you have to be more comfortable with that than me. That is an example of one of the situations that come out for this particular issue. I still think today that these baby boomer protestors who are in their (19)50s and (19)60s right now should get comfortable with what they did, accept it and move along and not try to get confirmation from people like me and other veterans that what they did was right. And for most part, I will speak for the veterans I have had contact with, we do not care about the protestors. We do not hate them, we do not like them. They were there, they existed, but that is done. And we are dealing with our own issues and we are trying to get through it all. And we have to deal with that same issue. Are we comfortable with what we did? If the answer is yes, then we are happy. If it is no, then you have to find a way to get to yes. And hating somebody else that is not going to get you there. But every now and then, I run across an old protestor and they push that button on me. They are looking for me to validate what they did. That is fine.

SM:
During that, we have had those individuals who were here, who were protestors during that conference. And of course a lot of people have met Professor Davidson here on campus who had been the founder of SDS. And he is very comfortable with what he did. But he never needs to have validation.

JM:
Good friend. I liked him.

SM:
Yeah. And he is so genuine, that is why I am finding out between a lot of vets that I have interviewed is the fact that they are... And I like your opinion-

SM:
...between a lot of vets that I have interviewed is the fact that they are... And I would like your opinion. Maybe they may never like the person totally, but do you feel there was a greater respect toward the person who was truly against the war, not trying to get out of the draft, but it was just truly against the war, was sent to jail oftentimes and paid a price for what they did than the person who was just trying, as you said, playing the game to get out of the draft, having a good time? Is there a difference or are all protestors the same?

JM:
No, not all protestors are the same. I am trying to remember his last name. David something, married to Joan Baez. He went to jail.

SM:
David Harris.

JM:
David Harris. He burned his draft card, did all the protesting, went to jail. For that, I think he could be admired. He, to this day, is a very strong war protestor. He is one of those guys that keeps trying to explain why he did what he did. Probably that is the only reason he is on TV is because of what he did. Now see, I do not have a problem with a guy like that. I do not know if many other people will. Muhammad Ali, there are guys in my chapter who said what he did was fine with them. With me it was not. I had to answer the call. I had to do the step forward. Anybody who did not do that to me was not as forthright as David Harris was. Now, if Ali walked through the door I would shake his hand, absolutely. But that particular thing he did with his life, I did not approve of then and I still do not.

SM:
The wall. Sometimes when you ask people there is an obvious answer, but every answer I have ever received is totally different. And the unique effect that that wall has had on them, just your thoughts on the importance of that wall in the veteran community, period.

JM:
It is mecca to the Vietnam veteran. It is where we go because we are drawn there. I did not go there until my 40th birthday and I told my wife that I was going to take my 40th birthday off work and I was going to go to the wall and I wanted to go alone because I did not know what I was going to do when I got there. I did not know if I was going to get half a mile away and back down. I did not know. So, that is what I did on my 40th birthday. And it was somewhat cleansing for me to do that. The reality still never hit me until I went with my chapter. And there I think is where I am headed with this answer. I think it is groups of veterans versus veteran singular. It is what it means to the groups of veterans, the VFWs, the Vietnam Veterans of America, all those guys. To us it is our home away from home. It is our mecca. And on a personal level, I am tickled to death that Jan Scruggs was able to do that. It probably took somebody like him to get it done, but thank God he was there to do it.

SM:
Yeah. You know about the politics of Washington to be able to get through the crap. Well, I will not even go into that, but you got to admire the person. You just have to admire him. You have really said some really good things on the healing process. I have a question here. Actually, it is going to go into the section where we are talking about when the best history books are written. My background is in history and the best World War II books are being written right now, 50 years after World War II. There has always been some good ones. But the historians will always say that the best books on any particular period begin 50 years after an event. Now, we are 30 years out from Vietnam and a lot of the books have been written and so forth, and a lot of books in the (19)60s have been written. But when the best history books are written on this particular era, what do you think they will say about this generation of Americans born over a 20-year period of time defined as the boomer generation, their impact on America, and I am including in this for your answer, those who served and those who did not serve?

JM:
Okay. Starting with those who served. Those-

SM:
You are fine.

JM:
Okay. Those guys were put into a no-win situation and when they ever had any movement towards winning, they would change the game. And then when they did not win, they were blamed for not winning. So, that has to be probably the most frustrating thing about that time for veterans who are boomers, the hell that they put some of those guys through over there, the combat veteran, to not make it worth anything in the long run. What we did in 1975, we bugged out. We left everybody behind and we just turned our back on all the hard work that was done. And that is probably going to be what those best books are going to talk about, the frustrations of the wars. Why did we go out every morning into the rice paddies and the jungles and recapture the same land that we captured the day before, only to leave it again at dusk day after day after day? That is senseless. If you want to lose a war, that is what you do. It is almost as though our leaders sat down with that purpose in mind. How can we lose this war? We cannot go into Cambodia even though we are being shot at from there. There is all these rules. Our hands were tied.

SM:
If you were to ultimately place the, it could be a combination of a lot of things, but if you were to just simply say point blank, the reason why we lost this war, who is to blame? Is it our leaders or lack thereof?

JM:
Our civilian leaders I think are responsible because they never had the intention... Well, first I think they found themselves caught in the war. The early stages of the war, we sent advisors under that catchall phrase. And I think as things got worse and we started to commit troops, we got stuck there, the quagmire that was Vietnam. And then our leaders decided for their reasons, which maybe in 50 years we will find out, that they did not want to do anything to actually win this war. And that is who I lay the blame at. Now, if you want to say Johnson and McNamara and Nixon, Kissinger and that bunch. That bunch. And whoever pushes their buttons, that bunch too.

SM:
But it is interesting. Military leaders report to the civilian, which is the President of the United States. But in the end, the joint chief of staff can still have tremendous influence. Are military leaders part of this blame here? Because ultimately oftentimes military leaders can persuade civilian leaders and the president that we must continue. Obviously, we are doing it to continue the war and they were getting reports. Is there some part of blame on the military leadership?

JM:
Yeah, the blame I think they should accept is the fact that they let it happen. And they could have easily done exactly as you said, use that influence. Explain to the civilians that that is not how war is waged, won today. But they did not. Maybe it is because they could not. Maybe the deck was stacked that much against them. Maybe they did not know how to do it. They have never been in that situation before. Maybe they just were not the Lee's and Grant's that we once had.

SM:
You go to the wall though, and you see the ceremonies there at the wall, the reverence they have for the leaders of their troops and the war is amazing. General McCaffrey, he has his whole big section there of people that served under him and he is almost like a god to them. Obviously, he cares about his troops.

JM:
What was he during the war? What rank?

SM:
Yeah, he was pretty high up. I do not know what his rank was during the Vietnam War, but I do know he always has a lot of people there at a wall that really... And of course he was involved in the Middle East War with George Bush and he was responsible for the killing of all the people that were going back to Baghdad. He oversaw that. So, he was off with his troops. He had troops during that timeframe as well. He became [inaudible] there for a short period of time.

JM:
Well, there certainly were those people who, if we had more of them, there would have been a different outcome.

SM:
I am going to finish up my last question and then I am going to just name some names here and if we want to take a break in between, it is okay too.

JM:
Sure.

SM:
But I want to get back to, again, this healing business you have talked about within the veteran community and as a nation, but do you think there is an ultimate responsibility on the part of Vietnam veterans or people who care about this issue to really try to heal people in a group, a generation, before they pass away? I say this because through history books, oftentimes even during the Civil War, I use the Civil War as an example, that there were years and years of opportunities for the north and south troops to come together to try to heal and respect each other as a warrior, and people who did not serve. But just simply say, "We got caught up in the times and I respect what you did." But I am not sure if I see that here as a generation. And it is like a funeral. I am leading into a question here, but it is like a funeral when a person has died and all the nice things are said about a person, but that person never heard it in their lifetime. Is there an inherent responsibility, particularly among Vietnam vets who have gone through hell upon their return, but they were the leaders in creating a memorial for the people who served in Vietnam, which has become a model for the Korean War veteran... It has become a model for the World War II veteran. They have become leaders in so many areas. Should they also maybe be a leader to make this nation better, to heal it and could do anything in its... Not only to heal within themselves. And you have really put it beautifully in terms of, "I do not have to heal for someone who was against the war. We have our own issues." But can we ever think as a collective, as a nation, so that this does not happen again? And we might be in one right now for all we know.

JM:
I think-

SM:
And John, I am going to turn this...

JM:
To answer your question, the single veteran can do a lot. He can run for political office. He can work within his community, things like that. But what I see more now, mostly because of my activities again, are the organizations stepping in now trying to not make change so much, but make things that are good better and make things that might not be good at all good, working within the communities as a powerful force within the community. Now, as far as healing, there are a lot of guys in my chapter who hold strong hateful feelings towards groups of people because of the war. There are people in my chapter that do not like the Vietnamese, no matter what side they fall on. They do not like the protestors. Never will. Those guys have their problems. And until we can heal those guys, we cannot let them out into the general population because they will just create more havoc. So, what we try to do is we try to work with those guys, not so much to change them, but just try to show them another way. And after that is done, then I guess it is the old story about if you want to change the world you change the person. And again, I think the veteran communities, the veterans organizations are doing a lot behind the scenes. And if you go to a VFW or an American Legion and ask them what they have been doing lately, you will think all they do is sit there and drink. But they do a lot of good. If nothing else, they put on the parades every patriotic holiday. They are in the schools working with the kids. And when somebody needs a helping hand, they are there. If there is an organization that needs some funding, some children's organization that needs a few bucks, they are there to help out. And I think they are doing a lot to heal. I just think the healing process is so long and the pain is so great that the pain remains the same size, it just becomes less intense.

SM:
When I interviewed Gaylord Nelson too many years ago when I first started this project and then I stopped for three years when my parents were ill, he point blank said that no one goes around Washington DC who's a boomer, who is in a political position or any kind of position, looking down on their arm and saying, "I am not healing. I am not healing." People do not think that way. But he did say one thing that really struck me and that was that forever the body politic of America has changed. The body politic. That is where the change happened. It will never be the same again. And as a United States senator, co-founder of Earth Day and all the other things, and ousted in 1980 like so many of the Democrats were... He was an anti-war senator. And course he was one of those ousted along with McGovern and Birch Bayh and a whole other group. He paid the price for his beliefs. But he thought the body politic had changed forever. I have some names here. Would you like to take a quick break or get a-

JM:
I am fine.

SM:
These are some names that I have been asking everyone. Just some quick thoughts on each of them and let me go on to the next one. Tom Hayden.

JM:
Married Jane Fonda. I think he was strident. You probably use that word quite a bit with the protestors. Articulate. He was good at making a point. I just think that the points he made were off the mark.

SM:
Jane Fonda.

JM:
We will never forgive Jane Fonda. Never. For what she did. And probably their biggest mistake was to become so visual, so much in the spotlight about what she did. And even now these many years later when she did try to make some sort of amends, it even came up sounding hollow. So, we just said, "Pfft." She is the second most beautiful woman in America. The first one is everybody else.

SM:
Lyndon Johnson.

JM:
The only thing I know about Lyndon Johnson, of course, is what they tell me. But I saw him as someone who was extremely good at working the political game. He was the guy who got us from the point of intervention into quagmire in Vietnam. And I think basically had a testosterone problem in that area. I think he wanted to prove something. He wanted to prove Americans had balls and that he was the head ball holder. That, I think, was his classic mistake. And I think he was probably the top dog in a kennel where there were a lot of little small dogs nipping at his heels all the time. And those people probably in the long run won out.

SM:
Hubert Humphrey.

JM:
Yeah. I do not whole lot about him. Seemed a likable kind of guy.

SM:
Some people believe, again, if he had had the courage to stand up to the president and he was pretty close to winning and beating Nixon, if they had said the election had gone any further, a week, Humphrey probably would have won and we had have been out of the Vietnam War even faster. We will never know. But-

JM:
No, not much.

SM:
How about the individuals that were the Black Panthers of that era? Huey Newton and Bobby Seale on the Black Panther party.

JM:
Opportunists.

SM:
Angela Davis and that group.

JM:
Opportunists. They saw a way to cash in, either for money or for fame, and maybe that hate that may seed in every Black person in America, they were able to exemplify and point it out. Which in a way is a benefit, because up until that point, we all thought that they were happy in their life. We did not know there would be angry Black people. I knew of a militant Black man in the army and probably he is the most responsible person to break me from my fog about race relations to a little bit of clarity in my conversations with him. But I think the ones you mentioned were opportunists. They saw, "Oh, here is a way to cash in some fashion."

SM:
Right. You had your thoughts on Martin Luther King Jr. and of course Thurgood Marshall who went through all the [inaudible] approach. Mostly Martin Luther King Jr., who also was upset with America. And just your thoughts on the civil rights leaders of that era, of which Dr. King was the central force.

JM:
I was working in Texas the night he was shot. I was working. I was helping deliver televisions as a part-time job. I was in the army. And all of a sudden the news was, he was shot. Well, remember, I am in Texas. And the people are dragging me in to watch TV into this TV repair shop, and they are talking about, "It is about time somebody shot that nigger, and we are going to be better off because of this." And I am sitting there and I am in some sense of sorrow. I am thinking, "Oh my God, somebody shot that poor guy. Here was a guy," this is what I was thinking, "Here was the guy who put it on the line. He got his whipped ass a lot for doing what he did. He probably had to have tenacity we cannot imagine to get anywhere with what he did and how he did things. And now some cretin has shot him down in cold blood. And at this stage in his life, he is on his way out of the limelight. He is being downgraded. There are others who are coming to the foreground that are pushing him aside. And at this stage of his life, he gets assassinated like this." And as it is turned out now, I do not know how many years later, he is reached near sainthood in America and to the point where his birthday might even become a national holiday. So, my major remembrance of Dr. King was the fact that the night he was shot, I was in room full of these rednecks. They were in their glory because this guy had been killed. And all I can think about is a life wasted and all that work and all that hard work that he did, maybe all that work he did will never really be appreciated. I was wrong. It has been appreciated.

SM:
How about Malcolm X?

JM:
Anything I know about him probably I saw in this movie. I read the book, Malcolm X's autobiography, while I was still in the army, compliments of my friend. He also gave me Soul on Ice to read.

SM:
Oh yeah, Eldridge Cleaver.

JM:
Eldridge Cleaver.

SM:
Yep. Classic.

JM:
And I think with Malcolm X I could just say, that anger that most Black people feel had a very eloquent voice. From what I understand, I only learned this from the movie, he was changing quite a bit towards the end of his life. And then again, he is assassinated. It seems though, when they are at a point in their lives where there is major changes going to happen to them, maybe for the good. They are taken from us.

SM:
Leads me right into John Kennedy and Bobby Kennedy.

JM:
Well, we all remember where we were.

SM:
Yeah. 40 years ago.

JM:
With Kennedy, I had reached the point in my life where my world was shaken because it gave me that feeling that I was not safe. If the President of the United States could be murdered like that, how safe am I? Because he had all those cops around him. Everything about his movements are scheduled and you cannot get near him, yet he was killed. He has been murdered. And where are we going? Well, who is the next guy in line? Well, Lyndon Johnson. Is not he a buffoon? What is happening? What is going to happen to us? That is what I remember most about John Kennedy as far as the assassination goes. It is a shame he has been reduced to how he died versus how he lived. We will never know what kind of president he could have been. And if he would have lived, maybe he would have been a lousy president, just one of those ones we forget about, but we will not know. We lost all that promise. Bobby Kennedy, I think he was a warmed up version of John. He tried to recapture that Camelot spirit, bring us back to where we thought we were with Kennedy before the assassination. Naturally I was sad at his murder, but not nowhere near what it was like with John Kennedy.

SM:
Right. Eugene McCarthy.

JM:
Clueless. He had a thought. It was a good one, but he had to have more thoughts to put them together and he just did not have the talent for that. Probably was a brilliant guy. Some of the things that I read he wrote were very well written. So, he was probably a brilliant guy, but he did not have the political savvy to bring it forward. And unfortunately, they made mincemeat out of him.

SM:
How about George McGovern?

JM:
McGovern is somewhat like that too. I think he probably just was a little bit more politically strong. I think the thing with McCarthy is that he could easily be led astray, and I think he was. Whereas McGovern, I do not think you could easily lead him astray, but you could still do it.

SM:
Some other characters from that particular period. Abbie Hoffman and Jerry Rubin, the hippies.

JM:
Yeah. Oh, I think they were over the top. I think that is how they played it. They wanted to be that in your face, loud guerilla protestor. And I think that is what they wanted. And Abbie's book says it best. Steal This Book. He wanted to be so out there that you had to kind of admire his audacity. And I think Rubin was just annoying.

SM:
You ever read his book, Do It? Rubin's book. Rubin's book.

JM:
No, I never read that.

SM:
I will tell you a story beyond this interview about him. It is kind of hilarious. Timothy Leary.

JM:
He was in a position to have caused a lot of harm to this country because he was an admired person because of his position. He was pressing drugs on young people who were impressionable. And I can remember when LSD was the then popular drug. He was pressing it and people had a tendency to believe that it must be okay, or at least not as bad as our parents are telling us it is if this guy is for it. But I think in his sense he was probably more harmful to our country in the fact that he presented that false impression of how are, how drugs work. Thank God he is probably being seen for what he really was. And I think what he really was-was just the guy who wanted his 15 minutes and snapped it up.

SM:
How about the Berrigan brothers, Daniel and Philip?

JM:
The priests?

SM:
Yes. Daniel and Philip.

JM:
They were both Jesuits, were not they?

SM:
Mm-hmm.

JM:
Okay. Not that that has any bearing on anything other than my answer. I am Catholic. Jesuits are considered the tip of the spear in the Catholic religion in that if there is any goofiness going on, you can find a Jesuit. And I think that is where they fit in. They became involved with the anti-war movement and they put the Catholic face on the anti-war movement.

SM:
What about Benjamin Spock?

JM:
The protestor or the doctor wrote the kids’ books?

SM:
Both.

JM:
Okay.

SM:
He is one and the same.

JM:
The doctor wrote the books that our parents used to raise us, probably relatively harmless that. I think that he was too certain of his thoughts and his beliefs and he tried to ram them down people's throats. I remember that from the interviews I saw on TV. It was almost as though, "Sit there and listen. I am going to tell you how it is. Dare not challenge me." And that bothered me.

SM:
Richard Nixon.

JM:
God, we elected him twice?

SM:
Not me.

JM:
Not me either, but-

SM:
No comment.

JM:
...in my opinion, a lot of the problems we had at the time we had because we elected him president. He was a polarizing force in America. If you loved him, he did no wrong and you would drink the Kool-Aid for the guy. If you hated him, he could do no right. And everything seemed to go down the hill because of it.

SM:
What about Spiro Agnew?

JM:
A buffoon. I am saying that because of how he exited the political arena. He was taking kickbacks when he was the governor and things like that. He was doing all the things that politicians do that make us hate them. And Nixon plunked him out of nowhere. And I think Nixon got screwed by the people who are supposed to do their work by presenting this guy to him.

SM:
How about Daniel Ellsberg?

JM:
Daniel Ellsberg. Pentagon papers, right?

SM:
Mm-hmm.

JM:
I do not know a lot about him other than the movie I saw. Well, first of all, by the movie, he was in Vietnam. And then he came back here and became a reporter. He supported the war, then he went against it. I know nothing. I believe his psychiatrist's office should not have been ransacked. That is wrong.

SM:
Robert McNamara.

JM:
I think he was an extremely brilliant and smart man who probably did not have a lot of inner courage. And I think he probably did not see big pictures. He saw details, and it was the details he would focus on to the exclusion of the big picture. And I think he screwed up and I think he will admit that.

SM:
How about Gerald Ford?

JM:
I think he was just thrust into the limelight probably because he was a good soldier for the Republican Party. It was fun when he was president. You did not expect much of the guy and if he did anything, you were happy. And when he screwed up, he probably just smiled. That is all I remember about him. And his stupid WIN buttons. What the hell was he thinking?

SM:
Well, history will oftentimes say the war ended. He ended it.

JM:
By supporting Nixon?

SM:
No-no. We got out of Vietnam on April 30th, 1975 under his watch. So, a lot of people give him the credit, and I am not sure if history has really looked at him. I think the role that he played over that two years... I forgot. Nixon was kicked out. I am not sure what people think really of him in the long run.

JM:
It is amazing you brought that up because I would not have remembered he was president when the war ended. In my mind, the ending of the war was an event in place and to happen, and it just so happened under his watch, as you said. I do not think he consciously said, "Let us end this war now." It was just ending. Somebody else ended it for him. He was just doing the leg work. Somebody else ended it for him, he was just doing the leg work.

SM:
You had already made reference to Muhammad Ali, but I bring him up again. Muhammad Ali and all the COs, conscientious objectors, from that period. He stood up late to the forefront. But your thoughts on Muhammad Ali and the conscientious objector.

JM:
Well, I will start off with general conscientious objector. If they indeed did their service, which was an alternative you had, you could go clean bed pants at the Valley Forge Hospital.

SM:
Mm-hmm.

JM:
Do your time there.

SM:
Mm-hmm.

JM:
Then fine. As it turns out, they were actually aiding the war effort. Because that was one less thing that we had to pay for. And the ones I had known in my life were pain in the asses because they would always try to make me feel that because I would do something like going to the military, that they were much better than I was. They would not lower themselves to harm somebody. And in my mind, I would always say, "yeah, until pressed." Anyone can be pushed into a situation where you will defend yourself, if nothing else. So I did not really think they had the courage of their convictions. As long as it was easy to be a conscientious objector, I think that is when it was fine for them. When it became difficult, it may have separated a bit. And if anyone held that belief today, after being a conscientious objector during the Vietnam War, then I will admire that person. But I think a lot of them now will probably be just as bloodthirsty as anybody else.

SM:
And Muhammad Ali again in terms of...

JM:
I think he wanted to prove that no matter how much we are told that you have no choice. You have a choice. If you are willing to pay the price, the choice is there. He did. He paid an awful price for what he did, I do not think he paid enough, but he paid. He lost his championship, he lost his right to earn a living, and he lost a lot of respect of Americans because of it.

SM:
Barry Goldwater.

JM:
He ran for president, right?

SM:
You run against Johnson (19)64 or the big one.

JM:
Well, I guess the only thing I can remember about him was people went out of their way to convince me he was so conservative that he might just be the end of us all. And I am thinking to myself, "How can anybody be that bad, that evil, that stiff- necked, that if we put him in the President of the United States, he is going to get us into a war? A bombing war? A hot war? Nah." And then Johnson did the same thing.

SM:
Right. Gloria Steinem and Betty Friedan, the women who were in the forefront of the women's movement.

JM:
Betty Friedan wrote a very good book about aging for women. I will probably be affected by that book that I read. As I understand those two women were front-runners for the women's movement, which was when it first came out, was somewhat laughable in that they did not seem to have a platform that was something you can get onto. Where things like inequity and pay for jobs, that was an issue and that is something they should have gone after and did, but there were other things that they harped about, excuse the phrase, harped about that seemed, "Why are you concerned about that when they had so many other bigger issues to deal with?"

SM:
The music of the period, how important was the music of the period in your life? The music of the (19)60s, in terms of both positive? And secondly, I have two-part question here, your thoughts on the music of the (19)60s and the (19)70s, impact on your life, and your thoughts on the musicians who were anti-war. And there were a lot of them.

JM:
Mm-hmm.

SM:
Joan Baez, was very obvious. Everybody knows about Phil Ochs. But of course you can even say John Lennon and The Beatles. There is a lot of things in there. And certainly Janis Joplin and Jimi Hendrix. And you are dealing with a lot of the musicians of that period who were anti-war, just your thoughts on that, through their music.

JM:
Let us see. First part of the question. What effect did it have on me?

SM:
Mm-hmm.

JM:
Profound. I actually believe that I changed as music changed. In early, well, in the late (19)50s, early (19)60s, I was into that, what they called, " doo-wop music," and The Platters and The Drifters and The Coasters and all that stuff. And then The Beatles arrived, changing music the way they did, British Invasion, I feel I changed. Some of my favorite singers, Janis Joplin, for example, to this day when I am feeling low, I put her music on to give me a list. I have got Joan Baez tapes at home. I love her music. A woman? No.

SM:
Right.

JM:
Now, she was too strident. She and Tom Hayden, they were both strident. So, now I think music had a profound effect on my generation because it was the thing we created. And I do not know how many of our people did, but we created it by liking it. There had not been a market for rock and roll.

SM:
Right.

JM:
There would not have been there any rock and roll. And then as we grew up and became the rock and rollers, we changed it once again.

SM:
Is there any one musician that stood out for you? Group or musician?

JM:
Well, I will say Janis. Yeah. The first time I heard Janice sing, the hair on the back of my neck stood out.

SM:
Oh.

JM:
It was a moment I will never forget. We had the album, Big Brother & The Holding Company-

SM:
Oh, yeah.

JM:
Cheap Thrills.

SM:
Yeah, the cover is unbelievable.

JM:
Yeah, Robert Crumb.

SM:
Mm-hmm.

JM:
We brought into the barracks and we had waited. I mean, we were literally salivating, because none of us had ever heard this phenomenon sing. So you put it on and playing it on your basic record player.

SM:
Right.

JM:
And as I said, as she started to sing, the hair in the back of my neck stood out. And what she would do for me is she would get me there, and then she would make me profoundly sad when she sang. And then the next thing out, she would make me feel excited. I would feel the blood pumping in my veins. She could do all that for me.

SM:
And when you heard she died, and the way she died, you may not remember where you were, but what were your thoughts on how she just passed away?

JM:
I remember where I was. I still feel to this day that I wish I would have been there that night to put my arms around her and talk her out of it. Maybe I could have saved her. Now, obviously that is ridiculous. But that is how I felt.

SM:
Mm-hmm.

JM:
And I was really, very sad. And of course, when Pearl the album came out, which was just finished as she died, that was sort of like her gift to us.

SM:
I am almost done.

JM:
Okay. But you did ask me about the ones who protested the war.

SM:
Yes.

JM:
So what did I think about them?

SM:
Mm-hmm.

JM:
I enjoyed it. The guy who wrote Draft Dodger Rag, was that Phil Ochs?

SM:
I think Country Joe McDonald was another one of the singers that was a protester.

JM:
Yeah. I enjoyed that. I thought that was great. I loved the protest music. Did it make sense that I liked the protest music? I did not care. It was funny. It was interesting. It was fun.

SM:
Your thoughts, I will not mention the name, one of the individuals that I interviewed, is a very well-known Vietnam veteran, pretty high up. And he has a problem. And his problem is that he had no problem with those people who protested against the Vietnam War who were musicians and entertainers. But he has a tremendous problem today with entertainers and musicians who protest against their current war in Iraq or are just out there protesting. He was making references to Ed Asner, Mike Farrell, the people that have been out there that have been so visible. And he says, "I do not understand my problem because I had none and I almost died in Vietnam. Yet I have a problem today, and I am trying to deal with this." I do not know how Vietnam vets look at it. Whether you think that Vietnam vets have problems with today's people who protest the Iraq War? Or they do not make that kind of thinking, "This is just one person's thoughts."

JM:
Well, there is a connection really between the singer protestors of our era and the ones today. And that is they should just sing and entertain us and just shut up.

SM:
Okay.

JM:
I do not want to hear Naomi Main's opinions about Bush or Ed Asner myself.

SM:
Right.

JM:
Entertain me. That is why I am looking at you. I want you to entertain me.

SM:
Right.

JM:
So I am bothered by the fact that they take the stage the way they do and the platform and then use that to preach to me about things like that. Just sing, just act, just do what you do. Do what puts you here.

SM:
Right.

JM:
Do not use it as a format to come after this. Yes, there is a lot of difference now of how people feel about entertainers who protest as compared to what it was in the (19)60s. In the (19)60s, it was almost the thing to do. Everybody was against the war, so you have to be against the war.

SM:
Right.

JM:
And then if you say, "Well, I am for the war," people would think there was something wrong with you.

SM:
I got a couple terms here. I just want your thoughts to these terms. SDS.

JM:
Students for Democratic Society. What is the young guys pretending they are at war with their government? [Inaudible].

SM:
Counterculture.

JM:
Good phrase. My problem with that phrase goes back to when the counterculture became the culture. And if you did anything else, there was something wrong with you. And back in those days, if you wore Chinos and got a short haircut, you were counterculture and they would not accept you.

SM:
Right. Yeah. Pentagon Papers, I have already gone through that, but just maybe mention to the (19)60s and (19)70s, people had thoughts about the Pentagon Papers.

JM:
All I know about that is the movie I saw. And James Spader was the actor in it, I do not know. That is all I know.

SM:
Chicago Eight or Seven depending on-

JM:
Yeah. They were found guilty of leading the riots in Chicago, as I understand it. What I remember most about them, other than the fact they were loud and a little bit obnoxious, was they used the trial as a format, as a springboard for their idealism. They did not care if they were going to become guilty or innocent, they just wanted the rest of the world to hear them one more time. And it was tiresome. I filed it very little because I got tired of hearing about it.

SM:
Kent State.

JM:
Oh, true tragedy. In all honesty, I think if they would have sent a regular troops there, it would not have happened. But they did not. I guess I am saying something against the Guard and Reserves, but I think regular troops would have been a little bit more disciplined and would not have happened, more likely, would not have happened. A true tragedy. Probably a pivotal moment in the way our society viewed the world.

SM:
What is that?

JM:
Love to have been there. Sat on a foot locker waiting to be mobilized to go there to keep the crowd controlled.

SM:
Oh really?

JM:
I was in Kansas.

SM:
Oh my God, you really wanted to be there.

JM:
We were ready. They told us that we had to, all these classes were canceled, we had to be there.

SM:
Mm-hmm.

JM:
We had to be able to move within a four, five hour notice. We would be in the barrack. We were sitting on foot lockers listening as much as we could about what was going on at Woodstock. And that is Woodstock for me. I would love to have been there, but I was in Kansas. I think it probably was that [inaudible] of a boil for the summer of love. Got to build off to it.

SM:
The leaders of Vietnam, during that timeframe-

JM:
Excuse me a second. That was (19)68, was not it?

SM:
That was (19)69.

JM:
(19)69, yeah.

SM:
And Reverend Pastor [inaudible] was there.

JM:
Okay.

SM:
I think 17. But it certainly does not let us [inaudible]

JM:
They used the term, "Summer of Love" and that was (19)67.

SM:
Right.

JM:
So [inaudible]

SM:
That was in San Francisco. President Q and General Call Key, those are the two people that ever remembers who were the leaders during the (19)60s and right after the war. And then they had a couple toward the end. But your thoughts on the leadership of Vietnam?

JM:
In most part, I will say that those who served in the army of South Vietnamese were mostly brave people. They lived a life where the war was never going to end for them, really. We went home after a year, they stayed. So, you know, hear the stories about the South Vietnamese soldier not being a good warrior and everything.

SM:
Mm-hmm.

JM:
But I think that was an unfair assessment. The leaders, I think, fall in that category where you kind of hoped they were not corrupt, because they were putting people's lives in jeopardy for the wrong reasons. Maybe they were or maybe they were not. I think they probably had good solid generals to lead them. I think they probably got told what to do by the American generals there. Mostly it was our show.

SM:
Your thoughts on the generals? Because when you think of the Vietnam War, I think of three, I think of General Maxwell Taylor, I think of General William Westmoreland, and I think of Creighton Abrams. Those are the names that come to the forefront over this war. Your thoughts on them as leaders in the military? A war that, I hate to keep saying the term, the only war we have ever lost, but I think I am wondering if history's really going to say in the long run that we truly lost it. That is why I believe history books, who people are unbiased will tell the truth.

JM:
They will say we lost the war and won the peace. But now to answer your question, I think earlier we talked about the generals, and I think I had mentioned that I thought they were just unable to not have the civilians call the shots. They probably were as good a general leading man as generals generally are, but they just did not have the political clout or the savvy to pull it off. They probably could have used a patent, that might be the best way for me to put it. Just a son of bitch who did not care. He knew he was right and he was going to do it. He would have gone to the Delta and marched all the way up through Hanaway, and they did not let us do that.

SM:
Just a couple few more names and then we are done. John Lennon; I would bring him out because he stands to the forefront of all The Beatles. He was killed in 1980, but he was this "give peace a chance," he was as anti-war as you can get. The United States, he is as high up on the enemy's list as you could find. They wanted him out of the country. John Lennon.

JM:
And you succeeded getting him out of the country too.

SM:
Yeah.

JM:
And he had to go on radio wearing a fatigue shirt with the, I think it is the second Army patch on it, I remember that clearly. I will go back to what I said earlier. Sing, entertain me, do not talk. I tuned him out. If he had an opinion about the war, it did not matter to me. It sort of just bounced off the wall.

SM:
But you listened to his music stuff.

JM:
Oh sure.

SM:
Yeah.

JM:
Well the music is a great equalizer.

SM:
How about Ramsey Clark? Of all these former attorney generals, he is the most anti-war person you could get. He was anti-war during the (19)60s, the (19)70s, he still is today.

JM:
Well then, I congratulate him for holding onto his beliefs. I know very little about the man.

SM:
It has been pretty consistent. And I am going to end this with actually two questions. One of them is a question centering around Country Joe McDonald, who was here back in (19)98.

JM:
I remember.

SM:
And he made a statement in the room when Jan Scruggs was at dinner, I think you were there, John, I think there is a group here at this dinner, and I am not sure if he caught everybody's attention. He made a comment that, and I want your thoughts on this comment.

JM:
Okay.

SM:
His comment was the reason why Vietnam vets have such a problem upon their return, particularly he was emphasizing the combat vets, is that that there were no POWs left. There were no North Vietnamese POWs. And he was making a reference that, "You figure out what happened to him." And that is part of the reason why there is guilt on the part of some vets toward what happened over there. They cannot heal mainly because what may have happened to the people they captured who were the Viet Cong or the North Vietnamese troops, who they in turn handed over to the South East were in turn just plain killed. It was a pretty strong statement. And it was just a reference he made and it was a joking kind of a reference, but it was dead serious. I may be interpreting him wrong, but I think that is what he was referring to toward the combat, that is not all Vietnam vets. Because you have the story of the POWs of American troops and of course we lost many and they were treated poorly, so we were not talking about that, but we were talking about why were not their POWs, those individuals who a lot of them were captured and that is what he was referring to. And that is why he thinks there is so much of a problem with the combat vet in their healing, reference to the guilt of handing them over to the South Vietnamese troops, who they knew what they were going to do them.

JM:
Well, I will say I do not know what they did with POWs. I know I was there when they had captured them.

SM:
Mm-hmm.

JM:
I mean, I heard the stories, but I do not know if there was an internment camp for them. Well, let me finish my thought on that. I know that there was a strongly held belief that if you brought in a Viet Cong warrior and fed him and gave a place to live and worked with him, taught him that Americans are not so bad, he would probably convince you that you had won him over and then as soon as your back was turned, he would be going back out in the bushes with his buddies. That was the strongly held belief.

SM:
Mm-hmm.

JM:
So I guess what I am saying is there was everybody believed there was no way you would ever get this POW from either Viet Cong or the Northern forces ever to stop wanting to go back and fight against you. That to me, that is the first thing that comes to my mind. I think if you took that issue away completely, the same guys you are talking about, the combat vets who have problems dealing with the healing process, but still have problems dealing with the healing process. It may be a part of that problem that they face, but without it, they would still have the same problems.

SM:
Mm-hmm.

JM:
And I heard about the guys that did things like that, but I never did it, nor did I know anybody who did, nor did-

SM:
And I may be in misinterpreting Country Joe, but he just made a straight comment, "What happened to him?" That is what his reference is to, then you be the judge.

JM:
Yeah, there was 300,000 of them missing, right?

SM:
Right.

JM:
And there is plenty of Viet Cong and North Vietnamese POW MIAs.

SM:
Right.

JM:
There is 300, 000 of them.

SM:
Yep.

JM:
We are complaining because we have 1,800 missing and we want ours back.

SM:
Was there one particular tragic event in your young life, and I am not referring to your service in Vietnam, is there any one American event that had the greatest impact on you?

JM:
When you say young life, you mean when I was younger?

SM:
When you were younger. Or it could be even today, but it is basically during that period, during the (19)60s and (19)70s. The thing that stood out, that may have had the greatest impact on you. It could have been a tragic event or it could be a very positive event.

JM:
I will give you what came to my mind first, the assassination of John Kennedy. That feeling that I was no longer safe. If they can get to the president, they can get to me. And I did not know who they were, but they scared me more. There is a bunch of crazies out there running around and I do not have any way of protecting myself from them. You cannot be protected from them. Kennedy was proved positive of that. So if there is any one thing, yes. And I will give you another example; I remember growing up as a kid, not being able to look at horizon without thinking of a mushroom cloud. And I, to this day, drift into that. I will be somewhere just looking out the horizon and I will mentally envision a mushroom cloud. So maybe it was the understanding of what nuclear weapons were, how devastating they could be, and how unsafe I was. Because here I am looking at this nice bucolic scene and who knows, some bomb may go off.

SM:
The last question, I guarantee.

JM:
I hope not.

SM:
I will certainly ask you for final thoughts if I did not hit something that you may have thought I was going to ask. This gets into the whole concept of trust. We are dealing with it here on the college campus. We are going to be bringing a speaker in next semester on the leadership of trust. Because I am wondering your thoughts on how that period in American history, because of the failure of our leaders, the very obvious failure of, and the lies that were told to the Americans by President Johnson and probably President Nixon, the enemy's list. But you can even go back to the Eisenhower when he lied about the U-2. And then you can go into President Kennedy. Well, did he have anything to do with the DM murders or killings? Then you go to Johnson, then you go to obviously Nixon, then you getting into the Reagan era about The Iran-Contra. But what I am getting at here is do you feel that in your youth when you were young, you as a teenager and in your twenties, that the trust issue, the lack of trust, the impact that young people had, whether they were veterans or non-veterans, had toward leaders. And I refer to not only leaders in the White House, but leaders of our churches, leaders of our corporations, leaders in university presidents, leaders in any capacity. The youth did not trust them because they have been lied to. And I want to know if your thoughts on whether this trust issue is something that I am over exaggerating or that really is part of the boomer generation, generation that is not trusting, and they have passed that on to their kids, who in turn do not trust who now will in turn pass it on to their kids, because they are seeing some things even today. Who can you trust in this world? I see that personally, and I mean it is not my interview, but I see that as a major issue in the boomer generation. But I may be totally wrong. Just your thoughts.

JM:
Okay. Well first, I think that a certain amount of distrust is a healthy thing. It is what stops children from talking to strangers and things like that. I am going to deal with the distrust you are talking about though. When I was growing up, Eisenhower was the president. We had complete faith in this guy. Well, here was a five-star general hero of World War II, builder of our highways.

SM:
Mm-hmm.

JM:
Almost a Scratch Golfer, right? This guy you could trust.

SM:
Mm-hmm.

JM:
And of course that guy, he had his vice president. He was a little seedy looking. But I grew up in an era where you could trust your leaders or at least you felt like you could. Obviously, I was wrong because we go back in that period of time, you can find lots of examples.

SM:
Mm-hmm.

JM:
I think what happened was there was this explosion of distrust during the (19)60s that happened. "Do not trust anyone over 30," common thought. Now those people, the guy who said that, is something like 65 now. I think we used that distrust as one of our shields, one of our weapons, when we went to try to make changes when we went to exert our own personalities, we were distrustful. And yes, we have passed that along to our children because we have gotten so good at it that it does not seem to be a yoke or a cloth we want to shed. We want to remain distrustful to some extent. And yes, there is a sadness in that. Now, I would like a world where we can feel a little bit more trust towards people. And yeah, it is probably just as strong today as it was back then. And in that sense, it is sad because I think, along with a lot of things that went right with how the boomers changed things, this might be one of those things that did not go quite right, it went wrong.

SM:
Mm-hmm.

JM:
By this time we would, I will use me as an example, I would want people my children's age to trust me. And if I ran for Mayor of Downingtown, I would want those young people to trust that I have their best interests at heart. I do not know if they believe that. And if you cross racial lines, I would know they do not believe that.

SM:
I am finished. Is there any other final comments or thoughts you would like to state on anything linked to the interview or a question that you thought I may ask that I did not? Any final thoughts?

JM:
Question that maybe you should have asked that you did not? Yeah, okay. We hit on it briefly, but I mentioned earlier that when you were 20, you have a tendency to gravitate towards people your own age. And when I came back and we would go to a party or something and the subject would come up, "now I am in the army, I just got back in Vietnam," or "I am going to Vietnam," or something like that. Actually, after I got back, I should be more clear. After I got back, I sensed the people my age who did not have my experience turned cold. Were maybe distrustful, but all of a sudden somebody, I should have something in common with I no longer do. And to add to the worst thing, I did not seek out those people that I had something in common with for 25 years. I did not do anything within the veteran community. I did not join the VFW, I did not do any of the things I am doing now.

SM:
[inaudible] hold that thought, I am going to change-

JM:
I was talking about being young and losing the trust of people of your own age group. And then I segued into not seeking out those people that I would have something in common with, other veterans for 25 years. And I think that was pivotal to me in my life, that I at one point 25 years later decided, "There is something in here inside of me that needs to get out." And I think I found an avenue for that, and that was joining veterans organizations and becoming active with veterans. And I think if I could add any one thing, it would be to tell any veteran out there who is not home yet to try and come home. Go to your VVA meeting, join your VFW, work through it. Because it made the most difference to me in my life to have done that.

SM:
And in the veterans community today, is it a strong unit? In other words, World War II and Korean vets, Gulf War Vets and Vietnam vets, there is no animosity toward them, there is a feeling of [inaudible]-

JM:
I am glad you asked that question. I think the Vietnam veterans actually changed that. When we came back, they did not accept us. World War II, Korean guys did not accept us. We were not veterans. I heard that. It was said to me. And we, the Vietnam Veterans of America, we decided that is not right. Never again should any generation of veterans turn its back on another, which is our credo. And we went out there and we said, "Okay, fine. World War II and Korea, we forgive you. What you said is forgotten. Now, let us be veterans together." And with the passage of time, the aging of the World War II, Korea guy, turning over the mantle of responsibility and power to the Vietnam veterans at the organizations, they have come now to understand we were not the people they thought we were. There was a cohesiveness within the veterans’ organizations that did not exist 25, 30 years ago. And we were not the force that was creating the problem either. It was the World War II, Korea guy who did not accept us.

SM:
Again, to clarify, why did not they accept you?

JM:
[inaudible]-

SM:
And was it combat vets or was it non-combat vets?

JM:
You would like me to give you their answers?

SM:
Yeah, their answers. Yeah, from their perspective.

JM:
That is the only thing I have, because their answers would be, "I spent four years in the Army. I did not know when I was going to get out of Germany. You guys went over there for what, 12 months? And maybe you did not even see any combat? You went on R&R; I did not get any of that. I was fighting for the world's freedom. What were you doing?" These are things that people said to me. Basically, what I tried to do was become wallpaper. I did not want to talk about it. People talked to me about it. Short story, buddy of mine was at the VFW, this was in the (19)70s, Vietnam veteran. He was the kind of guy that would go in there and say, "I do not give a damn if you accept me as a veteran. I am joining. Here is my DD 214, now sign me up." They signed him up. He became active. He came like vice president, vice commander, whatever they call that. And he would drag guys like me there to join. I mean, that is a good veteran. He is a good member of any organization. And one night he dragged me to the VFW in Downingtown. And I am sitting at the bar and my friend is going around the bar talking to his buddies. And he has told the bartender, whose name was Bernie, I will never forget, "Bernie, get this guy an application. He is with me," like that. No application; drinks, no application. Finally, he goes, "Hey Bernie, give this guy an application. He wants to join." Now, he did not ask me if I wanted to join. He just wanted to get the application in my hand. Guy sitting over to my left said, "I think we have enough Vietnam veterans in this club." Not under his breath. And then there was that missing shock that did not come. Nobody said anything to him, like, "Shut your face," or, "You are out of line." None of that happened. My friend, I am expecting him to go ballistic, but nobody else did. So I pushed my drink back towards the bar and I said, "I am out of here." And I never walked back into that VFW again until the night I joined the VVF, which had to be, I do not know, 15 years later. And that happened. And people will say, "Well, cannot you forgive?" Yeah, we did. We forgave these guys. That is why the veteran’s organizations today are so good. And that is why these guys coming up from first Persian Gulf War to this one now, it is going to be much better. We paved the way for these things to work for them. There is my answer to your question.

SM:
And of course, that experience you had with the World War II vets, and then you had to deal with all these Americans who treated the vets poorly upon their return and trying to figure out why... in your estimation, as to why vets were treated poorly upon their return, do you think it went back to how the media portrayed the vets in terms on the news, the bad things that happened in Vietnam, whether it be the My Lai massacre, the drug scene, as we got into the late (19)60s? And actually, there was a lot of people did not want to fight in the late (19)60s that were actually over there. When you look at the American population as the whole, and their very poor treatment of Vietnam vets, I know each one has their own individual story, and probably each person has their reason for not treating vets properly, but in general terms, why do you think Americans treated vets so poorly upon their return?

JM:
They were confusing the war with the warrior. They did not like the war, so ergo, we were the problem. And a couple young people would confront me in my lifetime, I should say, and ask me, "Why did not I not go? Why did not I just stand up and say, 'I am not going'"? Well, I was in the Army. They would court-martial you, they would throw you in jail for that. "Well, if I would have been in the service, that is what I would have done." I said, "But you are not in the service. You have this right to say this. I do not have that choice. When I signed up for the army, I gave away, in my mind, the rights to do that." And I pretty much always would never do anything that I could not live with. I could not live with that, saying, "Well, I am not going to fight. I am not going to go to Vietnam. Even though you are trying to send me over there, forget about it. I will not go." I could not live with that decision. I would not be happy today if I would have made that decision.

SM:
Would you agree that one of the commonalities of all veterans, no matter what war they faced, and that would be World War II vets, Korea, Vietnam, and maybe even the Gulf War and the young people coming back today from Iraq, is that it is such a private thing that oftentimes vets in general just keep quiet and do not tell themselves... Because it is all too common now in the stories of World War II vets about parents who never came back and told their families about anything. They just went on with their lives. Korean War vets were that way as well. We know about the Vietnam vets. Is this just something that is common to the warrior?

JM:
Yeah. I once wrote that silence is the language of the veteran. We know silence and we are more comfortable with it. I did not talk about it. I was with the Rotary Club of Downingtown for nine years. And after I made my transformation into becoming a veteran, I spoke in front of them and I said to them, "My name is John Morris. I am a Vietnam veteran." That group never heard that from me before. Yeah, that silence is our language. We were comfortable with it. We were miserable in it, but it is more comfortable sometimes than talking. I know if I start talking to a veteran and I can just see he is uncomfortable talking, we drift right into silence. And it is that acceptance, that thing, "I am not going to make you talk, sir." Fine. I understand. It is that acceptance that works.

SM:
In conclusion here, could you just state your name again and your date of birth and what you are currently doing and where you live?

JM:
My name is John Morris. I was born 11/29/45. I work selling concrete products for Binkley and Ober in Lancaster, and I live in Downingtown.

SM:
And also, and proudly state your position with VVA, because I know you are an ... John, you are. You are an outstanding citizen of Chester County, and just some of the things that you have done once you joined the veteran organizations and what you have done for vets over these past few years.

JM:
Currently, I am on the board of directors, have been for about five years. I am just finished my eighth year of writing a monthly newsletter we call the Voice of 436. I am fortunate enough to have the local newspaper, daily local news, republish my articles that I write in that newsletter. I have been in every chair there is for the Vietnam Veterans of America. I have been the vice president, I have been the president. One of my proudest moments as president was working with Steve McKiernan to bring The Wall That Heals here to West Chester University. I think of that as my crowning moment, as my year of ... as a veteran. The other things we do, I work with other newsletter editors throughout the country. We swap our magazines and we trade ideas, things like that. Other than that, I think I have a few other things, but that is pretty much got it covered.

SM:
Well, John, I just want to say, as I always do when I see you and all Vietnam vets, welcome home.

JM:
Thank you, Steve.

SM:
And thank you very much for the opportunity to interview you.

JM:
My pleasure.

SM:
...with that in mind, when you think of the 1960s, and actually when you think of your youth, what is the first thing that comes to your mind for that entire period?

JM:
My military service, of course, without a doubt. And that was (19)65, (19)67.

SM:
Explain a little more detail why that was the defining moment in your youth.

JM:
It was when I left home. I graduated high school, went on to college, and then got a job going to night school, and bam, suddenly I was out of town, and not on a vacation to Atlantic City. I got to see a piece of the country that had the culture, that had no idea existed.

SM:
What culture was that?

JM:
It would be a culture where you saw people who had never worn shoes before they were drafted into the military, they came from the boondocks; a culture where the Civil War was not ancient history, it was current history, things like that.

SM:
And the community that you were stationed in that you saw this?

JM:
Everywhere from, let us say, Fort Gordon, Georgia... we are talking about the military community, to Fort Bliss, El Paso, Texas. For example, when I got to El Paso, there were signs above the restroom doors in the train station that said, "Whites" and "Colored." And it was like you might have seen that in the (19)60s on a newspaper during the marches, but it was like that is on TV, but damn, this really exists.

SM:
How were you treated as members of the military during the time you were stationed there?

JM:
The people treated us extremely well. El Paso, Texas is a military town. Fort Bliss, Fort Bliss at that time was probably the largest military installation in the United States. Something like 65,000 troops were there. It is huge, absolutely huge. And it was also a ... not just Fort Bliss, but it was also an Air Force base, a strategic air command base built up against it, and White Sands Missile Range, which is also up against it. So you could drive for 100 miles and not leave to the military installation.

SM:
How many years you was stationed there?

JM:
Almost a full two years.

SM:
And those two years, again, were...

JM:
Two years were 1965, September (19)65, to September (19)67.

SM:
When you think of that particular period and you think of the boomer generation, one of the things that comes to mind often amongst people in that age group is that they felt they were the most unique generation in American history, that they were the generation that was going to change the world for the better, a generation that was going to end, racism, sexism, poverty, end all wars, bring peace to the world, bring general harmony. And this is the commentary not of boomers as they age, but boomers when they were young. Your thoughts on that kind of a mentality from the (19)60s and (19)70s?

JM:
At least my viewpoint was there was nothing that this country could not do. Putting a man on the moon, not a problem. We had the engineering, we had the talent, we had the vision, we could do it all. I found myself working for GE Missile and Space in Philadelphia, doing nothing significant other than playing with these things, which were eventually to become warheads. And that was just the way it was. Every now and then you would have somebody try to picket a building that we were working in because we were making nuclear nose guns. That is fine with me. I am glad we are making them, and I am glad we are making them better than the other guys, I hope. And that is the way I looked at that. But a different kind of a mindset I think than [inaudible 00:16:39] but again, it was a positive attitude that we could do things. Again, it was also the realization that there is this tide of, "Let us get rid of this racial persecution. It is terrible." And for the most part, it was like I never really cognizant of it. It was not something in our house that was done except the N word, as they say today, was periodically used. And when I went into the military, again in (19)65, I left a lily-white environment, for the most part, into a racially more integrated military than you would find in my neighborhood, I think.

SM:
Your neighborhood is?

JM:
My neighborhood is northeast Philadelphia. I do not remember the year, but I remember it was either in (19)57 or it would have been like 1960 when Northeast High first opened up, or one of the first early years of it. And one of the Black teachers had her son transfer in, and he was the first Black student. And again, Northeast High was huge. We had about 3,800 students in that high school, and one kid was Black. And it was nothing like, "Oh, that is unusual." And that was it. But it was one of those things that you remember.

SM:
One of the things in recent years from pundits on television or around the radio, whether they be George Will or when Newt Gingrich took over in the Republican Revolution, (19)94, you heard the commentary, that there is an overall criticism of the boomer generation as the reason why we have so many problems in this world today and why our culture has, some would say, gone backward. And this is not me, this is others. The criticisms are leveled at the breakup of the family, the use of drugs, disrespect for authority, and all these other things. Your thoughts on the pundits of the world who will generalize the boomer generation as being more negative than positive with respect to our culture today?

JM:
I would have to say that it was not so much them as the media and the media revolution. Everybody by the (19)60s had one TV in the house. I grew up with a TV in the house from 1949. I remember us having a TV when we lived in South Philly, and I remember neighbors coming in to watch TV in our house. It was a big deal. Today, our kids run around with cell phones. Our children run around with cell phones. But the communications revolution has been, I think, a major player in the perception of what the boomer culture was for, was against, and was it 80 percent for or 80 percent against? I think the spin on that came from the media, which I will go to my grave believing is a liberal, left side of the continuum, the political continuum. And they are biased. And I do not stamp all of them as being unethical, but you have got to be balanced in reporting. And I do not think they were balanced, and I think it holds true to today.

SM:
So you are talking about the (19)60s and 2003?

JM:
Correct. A huge span of time. And the biggest difference is now that if you want a different slant on what you are seeing, you can go to a different cable channel. You can press a button and you can get the BBC and you will see, "Whoa, wait a second, let me rethink this. I am hearing something different than what I am being spoon-fed every day from Channel 6," I will pick on Channel 6, "every day." It is different if you go to CNN. It is different if you go to nbc.com. It is different if you go to BBC. [inaudible] well, that is a different opinion. But the fact that whoever controlled the media back then really controlled what the people were being fed and educated with. And that is my two cents on the media.

SM:
So when you are talking about George Will and you are talking about New Gingrich, were they off-key? They were conservatives, packing the liberals.

JM:
It is like point, counterpoint. On one side, you can have George will, and on the other side you can have George Stephanopoulos.

SM:
[inaudible] I do not believe somebody is phoning me. Hang on one second. When you look at the boomer generation, could you give me some of the qualities... And by boomers, I mean the young people from the (19)60s and early (19)70s or middle (19)70s. When you look at that generation, what are some of the positive qualities that you saw in these young people, and some of the negative qualities?

JM:
Again, just I guess the positive ones is that we seemed focused. It was go to college. It was get a career. It was really just try to be that next rung of the socioeconomic ladder than your parents, because the parents would tell us, "I do not want you to work like a dog like me. I want you to get an education. I want you to do good things and get out there." It was a generation of Boy Scouts. It was not so much community service as it was you do the right things. And if you did something wrong, by the way, out on the street doing some mischief, you did not have to worry about your parents coming after you. The neighbors saw you. They would grab you by the scruff of the neck, drag you to your house, then you were really in trouble. But nobody got away with a whole lot. It was the eyes and ears of a community that kept a bunch of the kids straight. Now, there was always a couple of kids who were going to get into trouble, but I think that is what makes us great. Some people get misdirected, some people get to channel it in a different direction and do good things. But it was pretty pleasant. There were the screw-ups that came with the times, and how we viewed it. This is the week of the Kennedy assassination, about 40 years now. That is hard to believe. I mean, sitting here, that is hard to believe, that I am 58. That was 40 years ago. But where were you and what was your action? In hindsight, my actions were deplorable. When I say deplorable, in my family, the Kennedy name was not a very good thing. My father would take his name in vain frequently, which I think he tied back to Kennedy's dad, Joe Kennedy, in the liquor business. My father had a saloon. Actually, both sides of my family were in the booze business before Prohibition, during Prohibition, and until the early (19)70s. So when Kennedy died, I know exactly where it was. I was jubilant almost. And again, I apologize to whoever I offend, but it was like... And I knew who got him, in my mind. It was the military who got him because he did not succeed in turning the missiles away from Cuba. He did it by trading off our missiles in Turkey, which we had six months later. So it was like, what a cowardly thing to do. Again, this is hindsight. What I know now, what I knew then, two different things. And I remember my wife, who lived five doors away, as it turns out, she [inaudible] terrible things on me and said, "Oh, how about Kennedy getting" ... I said, "No loss." And again, this is a very politically aware, historically-oriented person at that time, at the ripe old age of 17, 18, whatever, and saying, "You know what? Hey, I am glad he is gone." Hindsight, I am an idiot. What a terrible thing to say. You would not do that. Even if you truly believe that, you are insensitive, totally insensitive to everyone else who was mourning. And I was in front of Bucky's Sticky Buns, Margaret and Orthodox, in Philadelphia bus station when I got to work. So do you remember where you were? Yes. I can almost smell the sticky buns cooking.

SM:
Brings it all back from-

JM:
It does. It really does. It is funny, different things triggered it. Again, this is Kennedy on every channel. But in our house, the Kennedy name was not something that you touted. And after he was assassinated, again, the marksman in me is... I grew up shooting in the Scouts. And I am saying, "The guy is a good shot, but nobody is that good." So to this day, I will still watch who shot Kennedy. And my younger brother who is only 13 months younger than me, if we want to really bug each other, say, "Which time do you want to take?" And we will go at the two-player conspiracy theory, go back and forth. And I am a shooter to this day, and I am extremely good. I do not care what anybody says, there were two shooters, one from the front, one from the back. And I am willing to bet it was the military, some... I will say a general, for lack of a better word, but some general who basically had the same upbringing or background that I was given, that "Kennedy is a bad guy, he sold the country out, the Cuban missile crisis was mistake, the Bay of Pigs invasion [inaudible] Kennedy's doorstep also. We are not going to let this guy do this anymore and make us look like fools." I do not know, but people have been shot for a whole lot less than that.

SM:
If you were to, again, look at your generation, if you were to list some things, adjectives to describe their positive and negative qualities, what would they be?

JM:
Focused, forward-looking or forward-thinking, very optimistic, until about the Vietnam War, mid-(19)60s. And then it all came home. I am trying to think of another word... almost idyllic. It went from idyllic to chaotic to unfocused. And I think it almost bred the next generation that came along and said, "I am the me generation. I am not worried about the world. I am worried about me, and I want my share. And I do not care whether you have your share or not." I think it was the (19)80s when they came around and said, "The company is worth more if you sell it off in parts. It may be worth $10 million as an entity by itself, it is worth $20 million to chop it up and sell it. To hell with the people whose lives are affected. Do not care. It is the bottom line. I am a Wharton MBA, and it is strictly business. No offense." My father's words to me was, again, "Go to work for a big company. They will take care of you. You take care of them. And 25 years, you will retire with a gold watch." I saw that die, but that was my upbringing. The happiest day in his life almost is probably when I went to work for General Electric Missile and Space and came back with a $ 10 check, which I guess is worth probably about $100 today, that said... He turned in a suggestion, "We are not going to use it, but hey, keep those ideas coming along. Here is a $10 check." And he was just thrilled to pieces with that. He said, "See, I told you. You take care of them, they will take care of you." And then Secretary of Defense McNamara would open his mouth, kill an Air Force contract, and they would let 2,000 employees go in a heartbeat. Strange times. I think we were a generous generation, and I think we were very much focused on that. Of course, culturally, I think the pill came around in (19)63. Did not do me a whole lot of good.

SM:
At home or away?

JM:
Either, either. And I will not go into that detail, thank you.

SM:
I want to get right into the Vietnam War, especially on college campuses. How important do you feel, in your own personal feelings, the anti-war movement was in ending the war in Vietnam? And anti-war is defined as primarily a lot of college students and youth from that period, as well as priests and political leaders.

JM:
Boy, like I said, that is a chunk right there. How important were they in bringing the war to an end?

SM:
Mm-hmm.

JM:
I think they were very important. And I would have to flip a coin as to whether I hold them accountable for prolonging the war or shortening it. Along those lines, I am thinking, again, it just ties in with today with Iraq. If I was an Iraqi general, I would look back on history and I would say, "You know something? When the American people lost faith that they could win the war, when it was day after day of protracted combat with no light at the end of the tunnel, the Americans gave up." When Nixon decided to pull away from the peace tables and bomb Hanoi-

JM:
...From the peace tables and bomb Hanoi. I said, bomb them back to the Stone Age. When 9/11 hit here, my first thought was we were at war, and I am glad my finger is not on the big red nuclear button. Because I would have pressed that sucker just to get even with somebody. Not the right thing to do. Again, this is me, not the 18-year-old, but this is me, the 58-year-old. I look at what happens again with the news media, the coverage of the war, body bags every night. And the station saying, "Hey, a couple of troops were dragged out of their shot-up Humvee and beaten with stones." And then the military comes out with a version that says, "That did not happen." "The wounds they suffered were..." And again, that is today, the story will change again tomorrow. "Was caused by the impact of the blast," or whatever. I think if I was Ho Chi Minh, and I think you can go back and check his history notes, you will find he was ready for a 100-year war. They have been fighting for a hundred years. If it was not the Chinese, it was the French. If it was not the French, he will take on whoever comes along. Iraq is probably the same thing. They got the Sunni, the Shia, the Basque. It is the same thing. They have been fighting each other for years. You do not walk into the middle of the Civil War. It is just a nasty turf. Ho Chi Minh, I am sure him and his followers sat there and said "You know something? We can take a bombing, but we can watch them rioting in the streets. We can watch them protesting on the campuses and it is just a matter of time. They ain't going to go. And we just have to wait them out." And again, with the electronic revolution, I said, our troops are watching this thing. It is not us watching them in Vietnam on 24-hour old footage. It is they are watching us live on a satellite down link to a phone in their hands. They are watching us protest. What kind of support is that? When you make a decision to send troops into battle, you support them a hundred percent. You do not give aid and comfort to the enemy. To see a picture of Jane Fonda over there. And I am just like, I know what she was feeling, but what was she thinking, when she sat on an anti-aircraft gun? She is giving aid and comfort to the enemy. And God bless America, she can do that. But if you are at war, realize that, if that had been World War II, the previous generation, the greatest generation. She would have been tagged with the name of Hanoi Jane as opposed to Axis Sally, or, what was the other one? Axis Sally and Tokyo Rose, and she would have done jail time. If they would have caught her back in the country. That was the generation that brought me into the world. And then all of a sudden what went differently that people would allow the First Amendment to be stretched that far, that we would not support the troops. Different story.

SM:
When you look at the movements of the time when you were young, because there were a lot of movements in the (19)60s and the (19)70s. Obviously the Civil Rights movement was in the (19)50s, when you were even a lot younger. And of course the anti-war movement and the women's movement, the gay and lesbian movement, Chicano movement, Native American movement, environmental movement, a lot of movements during that era. Is there one movement that you think truly does define the boomer generation and truly defines America? When you think of the youth of the (19)60s, and when I say youth of the (19)60s, I mean people who were born and obviously raised in the late (19)40s and (19)50s through their mid (19)60s and then of course going to college in the (19)60s and (19)70s. So what movement would you say, is there one that stands out?

JM:
There was several that stand out. Number one, all the Vietnam vets. Every last one of them. And I think there were like, I do not know the numbers, probably 3 million of them. And again, guys like myself who I got orders for Vietnam and never went, had to go, got very lucky. But I did my battle on Temple University's campus. Again, I got out in (19)67, went to Temple University, back to school, (19)68, (19)69 and (19)70. The height of the anti-war movement. The cubicles next to our, we had a group called Veterans at Temple, just veterans who gathered together because we did not fit in. We were not your normal students. Besides being older, we had just seen a whole lot of other stuff. We had been outside the campus. We had left home, and come back. But next to us we had Students for a Democratic Society, we had Veterans Against the War, Veterans at Temple. We had some Black student league, I think was the name of the first Black organization on campus. There was a Black veterans' organization we also had who banded together in our own group, strictly Black, strictly veteran, strictly to become teachers and go back and teach their own, and pull them out of the ghetto. So a unique environment.

SM:
So you are really Civil Rights, or anti-war was there or...

JM:
Civil Rights was huge. Absolutely huge in the (19)60s and the war movement were probably the two biggest movements. I do not think the women's movement was that big. And again, I hope nobody horse whips me for blasphemy, but I am going back into history. I remember saying in high school, I had no problem with a woman getting a scholarship to college if she takes it and does more with it than just marry a guy. If she uses that education. Because for the most part, and to this day I know it, women are far smarter than guys. I do not know, we are good for hunting and getting dirty, but I think ounce for ounce, women have a certain intellectual evolutionary advantage on thinking on the guys. And I do not know what, it is all testosterone or lack thereof or what. But I remember feeling that.

SM:
Do you remember at the time, did you sense that when you were at Temple University that there was a togetherness amongst the African American students who were fighting for civil rights and certainly there were many white students who were in Freedom Summer. And was there ever a split where African American students went to strictly work on civil rights and white students went to work on the anti-war movement? Did you see that at Temple when you were there, particularly in the late (19)60s?

JM:
I would say so. I recall my disassociation from the Black movement. I forget who the speaker was, but Cecil Moore, who now has a street named after him in Philadelphia and his entourage of thugs/bodyguards, came to some kind of a demonstration on campus. And literally one of those guys shoved me out of the way, from the back. Like cold cocking me. Well, I turned around and I was going to take a shot at the guy, but again, I learned something in the army, you do not take on an army if you are a patrol of one. He had the biggest guys surrounding him. And the Black movement was getting very militaristic. You had the Black Panthers for a number of years already. I felt unsafe on Temple's campus. Matter fact, my only word to my daughter to this day, I will swear to it. And so will she. She had her choice in any college she could go to take that thing from Bill Cosby. And I said, "You can go to any college you want." Bill Cosby chose Temple. I had no choice. I took Temple, the only one I could afford under the GI Bill. There was no way in hell I would let her go to Temple University's campus. To this day, I think it is unsafe. When I was there, it was unsafe. A white student was gunned down two hours before I was across the same spot by a bunch of kids who just wanted to kill a whitey. Memories of the (19)60s? Yeah, those are some of the memories I had. There was that schism. I do not think any the Black students were doing anything other than saying we are not going to go to Vietnam, because I think the rumor was, percentage wise, they were directly more Blacks than Whites. To this day, I do not believe that I is true. And I think the statistics of whoever you check will go one way or the other. But it is not like 90 percent, it is more like you want to be 40 percent or you want to be 60 percent?

SM:
I am going to get into another area here, commentary. When you look at the Vietnam Memorial itself, the Vietnam Memorial is one of the greatest things that has ever happened to America. I am pretty biased on that. This is your interview though.

JM:
Yeah.

SM:
How do you feel the Vietnam Memorial has done with respect to the Vietnam veteran and their families, number one, but secondly, what the wall has done for America as a nation? Have we healed?

JM:
I think we are still healing. I think it has been tremendous. I remember personally being against the design when I first saw it. I do not think you can appreciate it until you go there. And that is like watching TV, that is one thing. You actually go there, whoa, that is a different thing. It is priceless. And the impact I think it has will probably go one for at least another a hundred years. It will be like, who do you go to see? Do you go to see the Lincoln Memorial? No. You go to see the Vietnam Memorial. It was a turning point in our country's history, when people suddenly again stood up, took notice, and either pro or con, voiced their opposition or voiced their favor, and clashed over it. And I think the last time that happened was the Civil War. Indeed, it pitted family against family. Well, Vietnam did the same thing. You had in the same family. Brother, pro-war, sister, peacenik. In the same family. And a lot of them took years to mend from that animosity. And that wall, I think it just has shown its healing effect.

SM:
One of the questions I have asked everyone in the interview process is, I have actually gone out and dwelled on the issue of healing. Because how important is it, with respect to the future of our nation. And what do veterans owe society to give back? What do people who were against the war owe society to give back? Overall with respect to healing, do you still feel, and I know I have a leading question here. That the divisions were so strong at that time in so many different ways, talking (19)60s and through the early (19)70s, that I think those divisions are still present in our society today because no one forgives? No one forgets, no one forgives.

JM:
No one forgets, no one forgives and it is just under the surface, it is just under the skin. Scratch it and it will surface. Again, yeah, we are looking back in retrospect, a lot of things that I did I would not do today. For example, there were anti-war marchers who blocked the staircase in one of the buildings on Temple's campus because a recruiter was there. You are not going to stop me from going to see a recruiter. We are talking about a company recruiter, a GE or DuPont or whatever. I basically stomped up the whole staircase stomping on my fellow students because they were getting in my face. And I was telling them, no you are not. In hindsight, I probably would have talked a little bit more, probably should have talked a little bit more, but I was just pissed. And it is like when you are young, you know everything. And when you are older, the more you realize that you do not know everything. Again, as hindsight is 20/20.

SM:
People have even asked me as a person who was not a vet. One of the things that I learned early that to gain trust of Vietnam vets or Vietnam era vets is to say who you are, where you were, and why you did not serve. And I have been very honest my whole life about that. Breaking an arm and there is a lot of things there. I will not go into that. But getting back to the healing process, when people go to the wall who did not serve in the war. It is my perception that there is a lot of guilt feelings, amongst individuals who now upon being older are reflecting on what they did. But not necessarily the true anti-war protestor, they got arrested, were in the service. And was really against the war. Your thoughts on whether there are guilt feelings and whether Vietnam vets feel that there are a lot of guilt feelings amongst the boomer males who did not serve?

JM:
Good question. Again, I know there are Vietnam vets who have guilt feelings about admitting that they are Vietnam vets, because they were not in a combat role over there. And I am one of those, and what do I tell people that "Gee, you are a Vietnam War vet. Where were you, Pleiku, Da Nang?" I said, "No, El Paso, Texas. Beautiful Fort Bliss, El Paso, Texas." And as great as I thought I had it, I know one guy who was a lifeguard in Hawaii for his tour. So it is the flip of the coin. I was in orders once; the orders were shot down. Two guys on one side, one guy on the other, they are in action. Whether they alive today or not, I do not know. It was the luck of the draw. I think there were people who went to Canada, and then Carter gave them an amnesty. And I think that changed history right there. Where if you would ask me would I allow my daughter to be drafted, and would I tell her "No, go to Canada." I do not think I would tell him to go to Canada. We would have the discussion. We really would, "Do you want to do government service as an alternative? Do you want to do like Muhammad Ali/Cassius Clay?" He basically said, "You can take my prize fighting title, and you can send me to jail. I ain't going." I respected that. The ones who basically said, "Nope, I am going to Canada." I do not hold them as high as Ali. But it is like there is a ranking. It is not just everybody into certain categories. If there was extreme religious reasons, for one. But the times I think really changed with Carter's amnesty as to how we need to look at that question. The precedent has been set. We can run, just 50 bucks to get you across the border. And you are safe for the duration, which we are pretty darn sure is not going to be another 10-year war. I do not think we will ever do that again. which is why I do not think Iraq will run 10 years. Closer more to 10 months. Where we get to the point that says, "We are declaring victory." As we probably should have done it in Vietnam, and then leave. Or you bomb them back to the Stone Age and open up a jihad that the world has never seen before. It is going to go one way or the other. It might be Armageddon. All I know is there was the Cold War that we grew up with, with nuclear annihilation, just a shadow away. And then we went to this new war, that we have been fighting since I think the (19)80s and the (19)90s, which is a religious war that we are still fighting. And people are just realizing this war did not happen... The World Trade Tower was hit with a car bomb, a truck bomb in (19)93, not 2001. 2001 was a couple of years back. That plane was targeted, those buildings were targeted years ago. And we have been taking hits. A lot of it, we cannot prove, a lot of what we can prove. But we are in a totally new communications and literally a global world war. This is a world war like no one has ever seen before. Make World War II look like a turkey shoot. This is going to be huge, and it is going to be huge, and it is religiously driven. Which means in our country, we open our doors to everybody.

SM:
How does the Vietnam War have the continuous relevance in our society today with all these, the war on terrorism, Iraq and 9/11? I can answer that personally myself, but I want other people to answer that. Does the experience of the Vietnam War have lasting and forever impact on America?

JM:
Looking back at it, the Vietnam War, and again in hindsight, is if I decide to go to war, I turn it over to our military men. And I basically say, "This is what I want done, do it." I do not say you cannot go above the 38th parallel in Korea, as in the Korean War, you fight wherever the enemy is. And by the way, you do not fight on your turf. You fight on their turf. Vietnam, classic example of a screw-up of not looking at history. We had North and South Korea, it was a civil war. We have North and South Vietnam. And we could not bomb North Vietnam for the longest time. I would have bombed them back to the Stone Age. If I could not buy them off economically. I mean, my first move is to take B52's and load them with food and radios, and I drop them on the enemy. Take a look what the rest of the world is doing, and have a good meal while you are doing it. And here goes $50 million, let me buy you out of a war. We can reach an agreement. Now if I cannot do that, if I have to go to war, it is not an interdiction. I would ask the military, I would say, "This is what I want to accomplish. Do it. And you have no limits. Get it done." They will come to me with the game plan, and it gets a political decision. We either go to war or we do not. But before we put one service man at risk, we make that decision. It is all or nothing.

SM:
I am going to switch this.

JM:
Again, it is an evolutionary thing. Where we are at right now is a global conflict. And I do not think the media is playing it up. The media is just basically saying, "We are in Iraq." Yeah, but they are blowing up in the Philippines, Muslims. They are blowing up here. Whether it is just Muslims or whether it is the... I am not sure [inaudible] just off the African coast. But if you have a religious war, guess what, that is nothing new. We have got the crusades. Go back before that. It just goes back way-way-way back.

SM:
Got the ongoing battle in Ireland between the Protestants and Catholics.

JM:
The Israelis and the Palestinians. When was the seven-day war?

SM:
(19)67.

JM:
(19)67?

SM:
Yep.

JM:
Okay. I was a Jewish chaplain's assistant in a country at war with Vietnam, with an allegiance to Israel, a religious allegiance. We had a contingent of Israeli Air Force taking this training, the same missile training I had taken. And the debate was, "How do we get off the fort? How do we get to Israel? How do we fight for a war that we could personally relate to?" The war ended before anybody could do anything really stupid. But boy that was a piece of history right there. The conflict that you are presented with, do I go to Canada? No. My case was "Do I go to Israel?" I mean that was the only thought in my mind.

SM:
There is a good point there. Because I am not sure anything has been written that much on our Jewish Vietnam era or Vietnam vets who truly cared about what was going on in Israel in 1967. They were willing to go over there and risk their lives as American citizens to help the Israeli citizens.

JM:
And just an aside, in basic training, one of the first formations we went to after we got to Fort Jackson, or Fort Gordon, Georgia, for training, was a chaplain's orientation. And they basically announced, okay, all the Catholic troops over here, the Catholic chaplain will see you, and all the Protestants and all the Baptists. And oh, by the way, if there are any Jewish personnel, the Jewish chaplain's assistant will meet you over here. Then they dismiss back to the company level and our company commander says, "Okay guys, I have had all the Catholics, Baptists, Protestants, whatever. Oh, by the way, are there any Jewish personnel? Please step forward." 10 of us stepped forward in our company. And he stepped back, literally stepped back, and said "Jewish, right?" said, "Yeah." He says, "How did I get 10 Jews in my company? I do not think there are ten in the whole fort." Uh oh. But as it turned out, he was just being... But again, from his vision, his perspective, he usually was used to maybe one or two. Again, percentage wise, the population, but here they were drafted out of Philadelphia, New York City, Jewish ghettos.

SM:
Right. Yeah. I knew a lot of Jewish Vietnam vets in Philly. Lots. I want to, before I get into the next segment of the interview, since you served the late (19)60s.

JM:
Mid (19)60s.

SM:
Or mid (19)60s, when that helicopter, when the news was showing on April 30th, 1975, the final evacuation of the few Americans that were left in Saigon. And then of course their allies there, the South Vietnamese troops and families that were linked to America. What were your thoughts when that was on the nightly news?

JM:
Thank God the war is over. The retreat is over. To me, that was the end of the war. We were literally pulling out the last troops and the war was over. We had lost the war. We had left with our tail tucked between our legs, and the war was over. It really was a good feeling knowing it was over, and to me that was at the end of the discussion. There would be no other photographs of Vietnam. No, it was over.

SM:
No thought of what might happen to those who were left behind and...

JM:
Yeah, I had thoughts about that and my thoughts were that they would be treated no better or worse than the Korean vets. If they were in custody, they would eventually be turned over, repatriated. We would have found out that they were grossly mistreated, because that is the way it has played in the Third World nations. It is the nature of the beast, the Japs did it in World War 2. The Germans did not mistreat the prisoners, military prisoners, but that was a separate little niche. Korea was a different story. Vietnam was a different story. I think you see the same mistreatment now in Iraq or Afghanistan. I think Mogadishu is, I guess, the one that goes back about 15 years, maybe? We were trapped there for a while. But Mogadishu, they dragged that trooper through the streets. The press played that up, and at that point it was, we were declaring victory in Mogadishu and getting out of town. Because we were not going to make a stand here. It is a civil war, it is warlord against warlord. We learned from Vietnam, we are not going to get involved in that again, it ain't worth it.

SM:
Following up on what you just said. When you think about when President George Bush Sr. Was president, in the Gulf War, we heard a lot about, even in Ronald Reagan's administration, that the Vietnam syndrome is over. And George Bush emphatically stated that the Vietnam syndrome was over. What do you think he meant by that? We all know what the Vietnam syndrome means, but was he prophetic or was he not telling the truth? Because it seems like there is still constant references back to Vietnam no matter what conflict we get into?

JM:
And I think that has to be said. Because it is the yard stick by which you measure, I guess, two things. How you execute a war, and how you treat the veterans who return. The war in Vietnam was prosecuted poorly. Reasons aside, that is political. It was militarily executed poorly, and the troops were basically shunned by their own people when they returned. After the 100-day war in Iraq, George Bush Sr., there was a full military parade. And it was like, yes, the objective was to get him out of Kuwait. That was done. The troops did an outstanding job. It was a military victory, clear cut without any argument whatsoever. And the troops were welcomed home. I believe the Vietnam troops led the parade in Washington DC, as their homecoming. And to people who have not been in the military, perhaps it does not mean anything. But to those who have served, there was that camaraderie, loyalty of saying, yeah, you recognized that whether we served as a lifeguard in Hawaii or a chaplain's assistant in El Paso, Texas, we put our lives on the line. I mean, I volunteered. I was asked to serve the chaplain. With the [inaudible], it is the same. Hey, let us face it, you are an expert rifleman, and you know how to drive, and I will probably get sent there and that is what you will be doing, is being my bodyguard. That is the only way you would describe it, I did not have to go. My military specialty at that point was a Nike Hercules missile crewman. 30-foot rocket. It only goes to Korea or Germany, fairly decent duty assignments. And nobody is shooting at you. Or I took Plan B, which is be the chaplain's assistant, and run the risk.

SM:
Did you volunteer? Or were you drafted?

JM:
I was drafted. But by the way, that is another thing. That it was surprising how many people who, oh, they watched either the football game or they listened to Bandstand. They had no idea that when the president upped the draft, the Secretary of Defense of McNamara upped the draft 50,000 a month. I mean, I knew. But when he did that, I called the draft board. I knew my number was out there, and I had been looking at different military branches. The Air Force offered me a seven-year deal, to a 20-year-old, "We will send you back to college. But you have got to get another degree, can only take it two or three years to do it. You give us four years after that." That is what, six, seven years? To a 20-year-old? That is one third of your life. And I said, "What else have we got out here?" The joke of it was I took my chances with the draft, thinking that military intelligence would make a wise decision how to use Private Mo Green. Again. Got lucky.

SM:
You have said a lot of things here. If someone were to ask you tomorrow at work, come in and there is a survey done, and "Please write down in one sentence the reason why we lost the Vietnam War." Why did we lose the Vietnam War?

JM:
Failure to pursue a military victory. And total failure to support the troops on the line by the civilian population.

SM:
If you were to evaluate the military leadership, not the civilian, and that is certainly the President of the United States, who gets a lot of criticism, but if you were...

SM:
...and certainly the President of the United States, who gets a lot of criticism. If you were to evaluate the military leaders, the General-

JM:
William Westmoreland [inaudible]-

SM:
...William Westmoreland and Abrams, and even Maxwell Taylor early on, how would you rate them, and their leaders underneath?

JM:
Yeah. Probably a little foolhardy and a little ignorant of history, or more concerned with their career and not arguing back, and I do not know that they did or did not, with the presidents, saying, "Let us not do this. What do you want me to do there? You do not want me to go into North Vietnam? Where is the enemy? North Vietnam, that is where I am going. If you do not want me to go there, let us not [inaudible]." Again, you can have the general spout off like MacArthur did to Truman in Korea, saying, "I am going up there, I am going to raise hell." I think that would have worked. I do not think the Chinese would have flowed across the border if they really thought we were serious. Now, they did. But I think at that point they said like, "They are not going to nuke us." I would have nuked the Chinese. I will tell you that right now. I would have nuked them. I would have done the same thing that was proposed by some generals, to put nuclear minefields between the north and the south; hindsight, really stupid. Probably a bad idea. It is like building canals using nuclear devices. If you do not mind the leftover radiation in the canal, not a problem. Very effective way of doing it. I would have used nuclear blackmail. I would have drawn a line in the sand and said, "Hey, you go back and you stay up there and we work these things out. And oh by the way, here is 20 million bucks, and all the rice you can eat, and education for your people." And that is cheaper than a war.

SM:
That is exactly some of the criticism leveled at Barry Goldwater and the reason why he did not win the election, because they had that one advertisement that showed the little girl. It was only shown once, and it really cost him probably the election. It made him look like a warmonger. And President Johnson followed suit with the Gulf of Tonkin.

JM:
"In your heart, you know he is right," was the Republican defense for him. And the counterculture said, "In your guts, you know he is nuts." Boy, it is coming back like was yesterday.

SM:
He did not turn out to be a bad senator, either.

JM:
No.

SM:
And this is just a note, I find it very ironic that he and Senator Scott of Pennsylvania were the two senators that walked in and asked Nixon to resign. What irony, what irony.

JM:
I recall Senator Scott coming to General Electric when I was working there in (19)65. I had gotten out of school, was an electronics technician working in GE, and I remember telling him, "Do not go into Vietnam. If you are going to do it, do not do it like Korea." That is all I said to him. But I literally had the handshake and told the guy. I remember telling a college professor, we got [inaudible] talking about the Vietnam War. This is (19)64. I said, "I hope we do not do it like Korea." As it turns out, he was a Korean War vet. He said, "You do not know what war's like." I said, "You are right, but I know you do not fight it like you fought Korea. You do not draw a line and say, 'You can escape over there.'" I said, "Let me tell you what I am going to do. I am going to kill every one of you, or we make a deal. You want to make a deal? Let us make a deal. We will stop all that stuff. You do not have to lose all of your cities, because by the way, on Monday I am going to take out this one. On Tuesday, I am going to take out this one. You can call it Hiroshima and Nagasaki, or you can call it Seoul. Call it whatever you want. But I will bring you to your knees militarily, and I will do it real quick." I think that is what Colin Powell meant during the 1990 Iraqi war, the Kuwaiti war: "I am going find the leadership, I am going cut its head off, and I am going to kill it." And that is what you do. When you go to war, that is exactly what you do. But you ultimately have to have a game plan. What do you do if things do not go the way you want? Declare victory? Respectable option. Who's to say otherwise? B, go for everything? Or just with withdraw with your tail between your legs? Not an acceptable option.

SM:
Some might say, though, that cut the head off, you heard this during the Iraq war, you cut the head off by killing all the leaders, but you still got the tail. And we are seeing the tail right now. Even though Saddam Hussein's alive, but if he were gone, this would still be happening. And so I find it interesting, you strongly believe that you would have used strong force and they would have come to their knees, but there is no guarantee they would have, because you explained also the Vietnam War, and then thousands of years and the enemies and we are willing to wait. Do you think that our lack of patience was another reason why we may have lost that war? We had been there a long time, it was a long war.

JM:
We had been there far too long. World War I was five years long. The Korean War was three years long, not even three years long. Vietnam was over 10 years. And we were not going to do that again.

SM:
The best history books, they are often written about 50 years after an event. The best World War II books are being written now. There has been a lot of them; Stephen Ambrose, even though he was criticized recently before he died. When the best history books are written about the (19)60s generation, I know a lot of them talk about Vietnam, but it is so part of the boomer generation and how they formed as people in our society, that when the best history books are written, what do you think the historians are going to say about the boomer generation when they were young?

JM:
They were presented with challenges that people had not been presented with before. And they had to make a decision at a very, very young age. I am sure you could probably go back generation, generation, generation, there is probably a turning point for all of them that they had to come contend with what they can do and what they cannot do. I do not know if that answered the question, but Vietnam, for the (19)60s generation, the boomer generation was it. And it marked people as to whether they said, "Well, I will take my chance with the draft," like I did, or some people said, "You know something? It is more convenient for me to be drafted next week. Let me volunteer for the draft." And other people who said, "I am going to Canada. I am not participating." They opted out. They made a decision to go to another country. That is a tough decision to make at the age of 19, the age of 20. I think the same decision was made during World War II, but we were the victim of a sneak attack. And the perception is it is the right thing to do. We are defending the country. We have been attacked. Vietnam was not we were attacked. We were going there to nation build, we were going there to defend liberty because the domino theory was that eventually... wind up with the commies in Camden and San Francisco. San Francisco would probably be a better breeding ground.

SM:
Right. Also during the (19)60s, President Nixon had the enemies list and it was a long list and included people from the media, leading activists in the country, Black liberation individuals, Catholic priests, to doctors.

JM:
[inaudible] sure.

SM:
What does that say about America too, though, the enemies list of leaders looking at people who do not agree with a foreign policy? [inaudible] ... surveillance of individuals who are against foreign policy or...

JM:
Now, we are not talking McCarthy in the (19)50s, right?

SM:
No. No, we are not talking about that period. We are talk-

JM:
I am looking at it as a continuation of... it is something that in my mind, even back then, it was nothing new. The fact that today we can look back at Kennedy's womanizing after Clinton, it is like, "Well is this something new or was it a cultural thing that was tacitly condoned all these years?" I mean, [inaudible] was supposed to have dalliances with his driver during the war [inaudible] but I just hope... I am not going to say that. This is just a continuation. I think once you crossed... there were certain boundaries, again, with the media, certain things are private, certain things are public. I do not think there is anything now which is private. Now, just a matter of the way you look at it, I myself am looking for a president who is part Boy Scout and also has the ability to look at the enemy in the face and lie through his teeth to the advantage of this country. I need him to lie through his teeth to our people, to our citizens, only in that remote instance where it is to the benefit of the country. But after that, I expect him to be a straight shooter. When Clinton obviously lied with his arms raised up, to me, that was the okay, the cart blanche for all future generations to lie, and sworn testimony does not mean anything, perjury does not mean anything, as long as you can get away with it. And that was condoned by the press. I would have crucified the guy, not what he did, but for lying about it. That is not politics. It is what I expect from a man. I expect a man to be with all the niceties of the gentleman, but with the ability to lie and play poker. But once you have been caught, I expect you to own up. I do not expect you to lie to a court of law. It just sets precedent. And the precedent is now set that they gave him a pass. I would not give him a pass. And I do not know how many of my generation would, other than my wife, who gave him the pass. I looked at her like she is an alien, but we are just diametrically opposed. Is that because I am five years older than her? I do not know.

SM:
You get into this whole area of leadership and trust, the impact that leaders had on us and boomers in general when we were young, and obviously possibly continuing through as we aged. When you look at President Johnson and the history books of the Tonkin Gulf Resolution, which we do not have to go into that, but we know what happened there.

JM:
Sure.

SM:
We know about President Eisenhower, and he did lie to the public about the U-2 incident. He did lie. And I can remember him being a little boy and seeing him on television, and I admired him. We saw President Nixon with his enemies list, which then of course we know about Watergate. Some people claim that even during Reagan in the Iran Contra, but maybe it is more Reagan's people than it is him. And then some people are complaining now about Bush not being up upfront and honest, and Tony Blair and others. What I am basically getting at is, was one of the impacts of the (19)60s and the (19)70s is that we do not trust anybody anymore, or have the American public ever trusted their leaders prior to?

JM:
Well, I think that they trusted their leaders, and I think they still trust their leaders, but giving them an ounce of doubt today would have been like a ton of doubt before. There has got to be that faith in your leader. But again, and I keep bringing the media into it, the media flavors the doubt, the media builds the doubt, the credibility. And they do it in such an obviously biased manner; and again, my jaundiced view of the world. But if the press says a Republican has done something, I give that 12 ounces worth of credibility, as opposed to if they say it about a Democrat, it is like no credibility at all. They are just not going to say it. So gee, who is more guilty, the Republican or the Democrat? There is probably a shred truth of both of them, but the media will play it up, again, in a biased fashion, condemn one party over the other. And for the life of me, I think they can play both sides of the street, condemn them both, and make twice as much news, but they do not.

SM:
What influence have you had on your kids? And I share that with respect to all people who were young in the (19)60s and (19)70s and what they passed on to their kids with respect to public service, the ideals that the (19)60s had that we were going to change the world, that everybody is equal; I am going to vote; giving back. We have seen this past week that slogan over and over, ask not what your country can do for you, ask what you can do for your country, which so many young people of the (19)60s and (19)70s took into it. What happened with the boomers, the 770 million who heard that and went through all the experience of civil rights, Vietnam, all those who we have been talking about, and passing this on to their kids who became Generation X? And then we got another generation of kids in here right now. Just your thoughts on that.

JM:
Well, I have got one of those kids. She is 26 years old. And again, very socially aware, very giving to the community, very generous. And I hope that she got those beautiful thoughts from myself and my wife. I think we passed on all the good stuff. I think she sees me go a little over the edge on occasion. And she recognized that dad's over the edge again. We are talking about a 26-year-old. And got her head screwed on straight and has the values that I have, which I think are pretty good; I am slightly biased [inaudible]. But again, a very generous individual. She will help out fundraising. She has volunteered for... the Coatesville VA Hospital veterans Thanksgiving Day dinner at the Stadium Grill is Thursday. This Thursday? Yeah. She will be working there, just feeding the [inaudible] the hospital.

SM:
[inaudible].

JM:
And she brought that to my attention three years ago. It is an annual outing for us to do that. But that is just typical of what she does. She graduated number one here in West Chester. She could have gone on to a high paying job anywhere. She said, "No, I want to do something else." She helps manage the Chester County SPCA. And she has got a heart of gold. So am I saddened that she did not marry a millionaire and support her daddy in the manner to which he has got accustomed? No-no. But she is very generous and she does want to justice. So it is like big plus, big plus, big plus. And I think all of her friends, to a large extent, are of a similar grain. I think it is a wonderful generation. I think they are looking at what their parents have been through and recognize it and say, "Well, if we can do anything that makes their life easier or avoid making the same mistakes that they have told us not to make," they are pretty good. They have their heads screwed on straight.

SM:
We hear often from the pundits and the media and everybody else that is out there that the parents rarely share their experiences of their youth with their kids. And if they do, it is either when a person's dying or has had an illness or something as they get older. And we also hear all too often that vets, no matter whether they served in Vietnam or World War II or Korea, just do not like talking about it. But as they age, their stories have to be told, Vietnam era and Vietnam vets. And I will get to that after the interview, about a project that I would like to see Chester County do [inaudible] every single vet that ever served in Vietnam are taped for historic record, male and female. But your thoughts on that in terms of the sharing? Because obviously you have shared. Do you feel just from talking to your veteran friends and maybe some people that did not serve but were on the other side of the anti-war movement, that they have not really sat down with their kids, that their ideals have not been passed down to their kids; what went wrong, kind of thing? What happened? Your story is a positive one, but-

JM:
Yeah, but [inaudible] I have seen vets in tears publicly in front of their families. Now, in our good old cowboy, Texas president attitude, we do not do that. You do not cry in public. Well, that is dumb. Do anti-war guys of the same generation, same timeframe, do that? They might. I do not think that they do. I do not think that they do. As for talking about the experience, again, there is some guilt that says, "Hey, nobody shot in me. I did not go in the Jones. I partied almost every night. So I do not want to bring that up." I mean, I am comparing myself to a combat vet. And for the most part, there were very few combat vets. An awful lot of people got wounded. 300-some-odd-thousand got wounded. But during that time, that 10-plus-year time span, an awful lot of people went in. It is one of those crazy things. In basic training, I caught a ricochet bullet up against my neck. How close do you want to get? That was an eye-opener, when you say, "You know something? It did not break the skin." It put a little burn mark. I thought, "Bullets are hot." So when you get shot, it is not only, "Ouch, that hurts," but it is like, "Ouch, that burns." So it is like, "Well, how do you tell somebody about that?" Well, I told my daughter. I said, "Hey, touch wood. I am the luckiest guy around. I caught a ricochet and all I got is little burn mark from it." They would not let me keep it either.

SM:
Oh, my God.

JM:
But I share everything, except the girls that I dated. But it has helped me build an open relationship with my kids and with their friends. I suspect from the comments that she brings back to me that all parents are not as open with the kids as we are. There is no subject we will not touch. And is it because while we have touched all subjects there is to touch? It has always been, "Talk to me. And you got a question? What about this and what about that?" It is an open relationship with the kids.

SM:
One last question before I get into the names here, which will be the last third, is very bluntly, what will be the last legacy of the boomer generation, the 70 million born between (19)42 and (19)60 or (19)46 and (19)64, depending on what you want to say, of which 15 percent sociologists will say were ever involved either in service in Vietnam or involved as an activist in any protest movement? So we are talking 85 percent of 70 million who never served and were never involved in any anti-war or any movement of any kind.

JM:
Can you rephrase it for me [inaudible]-

SM:
What do you feel the lasting legacy of this generation will be, I guess when they are all gone? I raised this because I am a historian by trade and before I ever got into higher education with my major. And I have read an awful lot of oral histories and thoughts on the Civil War and how the Civil War people never healed. They went to their graves hating the South or the North, never forgiving, although they had had the great ceremonies in Gettysburg where they tried to come together, but many would not. And all too often the sadness that historians have written about the Civil War veterans who just never, ever healed or wanted to heal. And part of the lasting legacy is the sadness of the bitterness that so many of them had when they went to their graves. So just your thoughts on the lasting legacy of a generation.

JM:
I do not think it would be bitterness going to our graves. I think it is more like we showed the world a different way, or I should say we showed the wrong way to treat veterans returning from a conflict, and to separate the military from the political. The military is a tool to be used with great discretion. And something which is, again, basically a great bunch of people who are willing to put their life on the line and not question the order, to achieve the hopefully correct politics of the country. And it also taught us that you just do not go to war without a game plan. And regardless of how it comes out, the soldiers who returned are the heroes [inaudible]. I do not think anybody will ever go to war again, and this includes the current Iraqi war, without a whole lot of thought and ongoing thought. But the thought has got to be constructive, the actions, the discussions, the politics. Rioting is counterproductive; not rioting, protesting, I think, is counterproductive. I do not think it will be tolerated unless it is done with respect. Again, trusting the politicians, we trust them as far as the next election. We do not have 100 percent faith in them. We know they are not pure. We know they are not perfect. We expect a level of honesty from them and we damn well better get it, or we will vote them out.

SM:
Which leads right back to trust, just right back to the whole issue of trust and how important it is. Well, the last part of this interview is just going to be your thoughts on names from that era, people who were in different positions, older or younger, during the (19)60s and early (19)70s, just your comments and thoughts on them. The first one is Tom Hayden, who just happened to be on our campus a week and a half ago.

JM:
And I am sorry I could not make it. He is a protestor. I do not think he helped the war end any sooner. I think he actually added names to the wall by protesting. But I respect his right to protest.

SM:
How about the other members of that Chicago 8 group? Because it was Tom Hayden, Rennie Davis, and I am going to get into Abbie Hoffman-

JM:
Abbie Hoffman [inaudible] Bobby Seale.

SM:
...Jerry Rubin and Bobby Seale. I will go right into Abbie Hoffman and Jerry Rubin from the Yippies.

JM:
Yeah, another group.

SM:
[inaudible] another, different group?

JM:
I think they could have been far more effective by being far more in suit and tie than clown makeup. I think if they wanted to end the war, as I told people way back when I was on campus, "You want to make a difference, go to senator so-and-so's office. Get an appointment, talk to the guy, send him a postcard. Show him that you are his kid and you have got serious concerns." But the whole idea that tipping over trash cans, setting fires, burning buildings, that creates a backlash and it is counterproductive. Make the system work. The system works. It is not perfect, it is not extremely fast, but it does work.

SM:
How do you feel about the Black liberation? There was Black power people who were... Bobby Seale, Huey Newton, Angela Davis.

JM:
That is Angela Davis over there, is not it?

SM:
Yes, it is. She is a professor at University of California Santa Cruz right now.

JM:
How do I feel about them?

SM:
Yeah, the whole Black power group.

JM:
I remember having to step in between a Black soldier and a white soldier during the riots of (19)65 or (19)66, I think. One guy's uncle got I think killed by a Black man. And I stepped between them and said, "Hey, look. We are in the Army. We are a unit, we are together. I know it hurts. And I know the guy used the N word, his uncle, his brother was killed by it." I said, "We have got to stand together." I think that they did the right thing, but again, it is the method that they used. They were far too confrontational, and it was counterproductive. But it could have [inaudible] it was productive. It could have been far more productive, I think, if they would have used Martin Luther King type... If you are looking in a mirror and the only difference is I am Black, I think you are going to have a tough time disagreeing with me if I am using your language, if I am using your wardrobe. Again, I appreciate this is the land we can be different. Thank God for that. But it is like if you want to accomplish a mission, you have got to be willing to make some concessions.

SM:
It goes right into the other... Of course, you got Martin Luther King, Jr. Then you have got Malcolm X. Those are two central figures of the period.

JM:
[inaudible] a guy wore a white shirt and tie, excuse me, a white shirt and bow tie, but a jacket. But he was different. If he would have put on a regular necktie, I think it would have been to his benefit, but he was creating a uniform. Good, productive steps and then a counterproductive move could have been more effective.

SM:
Dr. King, of course, is known as the civil rights leader who became involved in the anti-war movement. In fact, he got heavily criticized in the civil rights movement amongst his peers. Bayard Rustin, right here from West Chester, along with Dr. King, were two of the very few African American leaders who went big time anti-war. And your thoughts on ... Dr. King always [inaudible] Bayard Rustin is that they made the comparison of being Black in America to being the yellow skin over... concerned about people of all colors. Just your thoughts on Dr. King overall, and Bayard Rustin, who were civil rights leaders who were against the war?

JM:
And again, being against the war, I do not have a problem with that. It is how you manifest that and the effects on the troops who are over there fighting the war. If it is perceived as giving aid, comfort to the enemy, I do not think that is good. I think it is counterproductive, and you are going to make enemies. But talk about a span of time from their days, Martin Luther King's days, if you would have asked Martin Luther King 40 years ago, "We have got this guy named Colin Powell and people are talking about him as being President of the United States and has a big groundswell of support," he would say, " 400 years from now maybe, but not 40" [inaudible]-

JM:
400 years from now maybe, but not 40. Hell no. And again, while Colin will not run, if he did, there is no doubt in my mind that he would probably win. He is squeezing. But again, here we are. It is only 40 years later. And how many years was Martin Luther King after the Civil War? That is like, do my math, hundred years.

SM:
(19)65, right. (19)63.

JM:
It is a hundred years to him. And that is forty years to Colin Powell [inaudible] Condoleezza Rice.

SM:
Right.

JM:
Very powerful, influential people today. Now is that because the media now puts them out front because they are black? I do not care. They are extremely talented individuals by what little I know to judge them by. But that is time. That is communications.

SM:
Can I take a two-minute break and go to the restroom?

JM:
Sure.

SM:
And then we will finish. All right. Make sure this is working properly. It is. All right. Jane Fonda, I know you have been waiting for-

JM:
I just thought of the-

SM:
How about that in Washington?

JM:
And I have seen that at other VFW posts around the country. Again, I know what she was thinking. I know what she was feeling. But what was she thinking? Counterproductive. And I literally rank her with Tokyo Rose, Axis Sally for World War II. As simple as that. What she did was deplorable. if she wanted to give an interview in Hollywood saying, "I have thought about it and I see no reason whatsoever for us to be there. I think it is a big mistake." That is one thing. But to sit there in an anti-aircraft gun in Hanoi while we have got prisoners over there languishing, and giving the photo op. No, no. To me that is, that is treason.

SM:
How about Benjamin Spock? Dr. Spock, he was involved in the anti-war movement. He was a baby doctor.

JM:
Yeah. Mr. baby book himself. I do not have any thoughts one way or the other about him, other than saying he was against the war. And I am sure he was in some rallies and stuff like that. But I cannot picture him being here. And other than the suit and tie, he may not have been. But...

SM:
How about the Berrigan brothers? Daniel and Philip, right from Baltimore.

JM:
Yeah.

SM:
But Philip died last year.

JM:
Yeah. Not a whole lot of thought about him.

SM:
From the Catholic movement. How about Lyndon Johnson?

JM:
Lyndon Johnson. I feel sorry for the guy. I think he either just did not ask the right questions or he got somewhat fraudulent, bogus answers from the military. When he asked, again, we can speculate as to what he asked the generals, but like Gulf of Tonkin. That is a fuzzy area that really, I do not believe that somebody said, "Hey, let us Trump up charges that the torpedo votes attacked the Turner Joy, the destroyer."

SM:
Right?

JM:
I do not believe that. I think somebody said something. They saw something and relayed, it got a little blown out proportion. Then he made a move, said, "Oh, okay, fine. Well I have got to have congressional war power because we have been fired upon." And he does not have that? I thought he always did. But I think it says as the nuclear commander, he always had the power to declare a war at a button's press. And he had the button.

SM:
Richard Nixon.

JM:
Talk about being at the wrong place at the wrong time. I do not hold him in as terrible a position. He got caught trying to do a coverup and he did not fess up. If he would have fessed up, I think he would have stayed in office. Just as Clinton got caught, Clinton did not fess up. He went to whole nine yards and stonewalled, unlike Nixon. So I hold Nixon in at a higher level than I hold Clinton if I am going to rank my presidents. And for that very reason.

SM:
And of course James Buchanan's the top. Gerald Ford.

JM:
Gerry Ford, well, I think he was just trying to do the best that he could. Not a whole lot of thought on that.

SM:
He ended the war.

JM:
Yeah, But I think the options he were presented was, we can either stick in there another 10 years, we can end it overnight with a nuclear catastrophe, or we just give up as nicely as we can. [inaudible]

SM:
Hubert Humphrey.

JM:
Again, I think he is probably a good anti-war advocate as could be described.

SM:
Spiro Agnew.

JM:
Piece of [inaudible] comes to mind. Anybody gets caught with their hands in a cookie jar like he got caught... He was a quirky personality. I do not think he could ever have been president other than by Nixon dying. But just I was impressed by his vocabulary, as was everybody. And his sense of humor. But that is all I remember about the guy.

SM:
How about Eugene McCarthy.

JM:
Gene McCarthy.

SM:
Not Joe, Eugene.

JM:
Yeah. Again, on the flavor of Humphrey. Anti-war, had his reasons, he ended very professionally, if I can use that term, with decency.

SM:
George McGovern.

JM:
Not a whole lot of thought on George.

SM:
Presidential candidate, 1972.

JM:
Yeah.

SM:
Symbolized him as the far left.

JM:
But no.

SM:
Timothy Leary.

JM:
Timothy is up there in one of those big clouds of smoke, I am sure. I could never understand him, like I said. And again, you are talking to somebody who I have never taken a drag of a cigarette. Okay. Let alone marijuana.

SM:
Never inhaled.

JM:
Never dropped LSD. Can honestly say I probably never inhaled other than might have been secondary.

SM:
From a rock concert. Yeah.

JM:
From somebody else.

SM:
Yeah.

JM:
Timothy Leary I just told was a nut case. Always did and company always will.

SM:
John Kennedy.

JM:
We discussed that earlier, going in. I think, again, because hindsight is 20/20, he is an overrated president. Camelot was almost a Hollywood manifestation by the press. They created an image, they fell on it. See, like all of a sudden, let us do cop shows on TV. Then it lasts about six years, comes back 10 years later. Let us do real life or shows. Let us do trading places. Let us make overage hotels. And here is another one. Let us do the Kennedy's love life. Okay? We cannot do that. So we got kid gloves first thing. What is his face? Clinton came along and all of a sudden, hey, we did not do it Kennedy. But that was then. This is now. He is fair game. But let us not overdo it. We do not want him getting impeached. We just want to play it for as long as we can. Let us wag the dog at the movie ring.

SM:
How about Robert Kennedy?

JM:
Robert Kennedy. Mostly kind thoughts about him other than against Sirhan. Killed him, but no great big thoughts one way or the other. Teddy Kennedy I did not particularly care for.

SM:
What were your thoughts of the general Cao Ky and President Thieu of South Vietnam? Those are the people that come to mind at least after the Diem regime.

JM:
Yeah, General Ky who I think is still a very, he is still alive in this day.

SM:
I would like to bring him here to pull it off.

JM:
Yeah. I think he, like the aristocracy of Vietnam at the time, Was doing whatever he could do to succeed. Whether he was militarily inept or not. I do not know if anybody could be a military genius, a Colin Powell of Vietnam. Unless the circumstances were different. I am glad he came here. I think he probably contributed to the country and is doing whatever he can do to make a buck. Just as he did in Vietnam.

SM:
Go back to, you see someone that when people remember the most for the longevity.

JM:
And I am just drawing a blank with him, to be honest with you.

SM:
Ralph Nader.

JM:
I bought a Corvair and the car was unsafe at any speed because you could not get it to run half the time. No. Nader, again, I think is like anybody else's. He just, while he wears the suit, he does not wear it well. And in fact you are telling us you have worn the same suit for 20 years, it is probably not the best thing you want to tell us. You would lose credibility. He could have been far more effective with a little bit of coaching.

SM:
George Wallace.

JM:
George Wallace. Interesting. I remember being judge of elections in Philadelphia when people were trying to vote for him. And we were told that you have to write his name in because he was not going a ballot in Philadelphia. We had people going crazy. But I respected the truth of what he said. If he said, "I do not want blacks in here," he was telling you, "I do not want blacks in here." Okay. There was honesty about him. I do not think the guy would lie about something like that. Of course, he got paralyzed and shot from that nut job.

SM:
Daniel Ellsberg.

JM:
Pentagon Papers, right?

SM:
Yep. Vietnam vet.

JM:
Leaking government papers is a no-no. I admire the fact that he did it. I think he could have done it better. Again, hindsight is 20/20. Do not ask me how, I think he could have been far more effective than having himself portrayed as a traitor.

SM:
How about Robert McNamara?

JM:
Think that is a guy I do not hold in very high opinion. I think he made a lot of very, very stupid, ill-informed snap decisions that really do not matter a big deal when you are manufacturing cars, but costs tremendously. I think he prolonged the war. I do not think he helped a whole lot. I think he was counterproductive. I think the war would have over far sooner. And if you want to call it a victory, it would have been a victory without McNamara.

SM:
The women's movement leaders, and you always think of Gloria Steinem and Betty Friedan. Those are that kind of the-

JM:
I think of Bella Abzug, myself.

SM:
Oh yeah, definitely.

JM:
Yeah. Some people had credibility, some did not. And I feel sorry for the women's movement when we talk about, well these were the front-runners or the initiators of the women's movement who stood by with President Clinton and basically, by their silence, endorsed his behavior, which says, "Well, the hell with what I have been saying to you folks in the past 30 years." Now stands behind his president, were so forgiving of him and forgiving by their silence. If I was a woman, I would basically tell them all to go jump in a lake.

SM:
When you are looking at women, it is interesting that during the (19)60s and (19)70s that during all the movements, men are in most of the positions of power and women are in secondary roles. That is why many ended up starting the women's movement. But they have learned from the civil rights movement. How important were women in the (19)50s and (19)60s with respect to not only the women's movement, but other movements, period? And we were finding out now how important they were in Vietnam. They were always important that it took a long time for women to be recognized some of their [inaudible] with respect to their contributions in the Vietnam War.

JM:
I think the whole idea of, or I should say the growth of use of contraceptives opened the door to women fulfilling themselves to the max. Being in the working world, making a decision to have a career or a family or both on their own terms. I think that was the advantage that came out of the (19)60s was birth control, which totally reshaped what they could do. Again, my biggest argument has always been their far superior to men, mentally speaking. I can still take most of them in fight.

SM:
Right?

JM:
Five out of 10 times.

SM:
Right.

JM:
But it always been, I have always said it was a waste of intellectual capacity for them to be just barefoot pregnant down on the farm. What a waste. They should be out there. I am thrilled when I see a leader who really excites me, who has got the talent and the guts, the everything. Condoleezza Rice I mentioned. There was a sharp, sharp woman. I would follow her orders into battle if she was a military person like Colin Powell or I believe what she says. She has got that much credibility in her voice. And I do not think she is acting. That that woman is pure talent, pure influence.

SM:
I am a firm believer that Hillary Clinton and Condoleezza Rice, will be running against each other in four years after Bush is done.

JM:
Condy will kill her.

SM:
Well, yeah. And the question is, if President Bush wins, because I think she is going to leave his administration, that is another story to go back and run consent. I just think there is some things going on there. Muhammad Ali.

JM:
I, looking back at the time, I said, "Boy, is that a dumb thing to do." He could have had it all. He could have done just like Elvis Presley, put a uniform on, be a spec for, tour the camps, be promotional and run [inaudible] machine and still retain his championship. He decided to leave or to not to leave but to serve. I respect his opinion. It was as I believe a religious based opinion, like a total respect for that. I think he should opt for military service. That is his call.

SM:
People like Ron Kovic and the people like John Kerry, the Vietnam veterans against the war, because when they came back, they were as adamant as Tom Hayden. Your thoughts on them and their involvement in prolonging the war.

JM:
Again, I think they could have done a better job, but they looked like longhaired, dope smoking, Commie free person. And I have not used that term in what, at least three days. But it is like, again, do not shoot the messenger, however, if the messenger looks like the enemy, you are probably going to take a shot at them. They could have done better. Wearing fatigue shirts, it was very symbolic. But smoking pot and growing your hair long and using F this and F that it is counterproductive because they are far more productive.

SM:
A lot of them threw their medals away.

JM:
Yes.

SM:
Purple hearts. John Kerry being one of them.

JM:
Yes.

SM:
The people linked to Watergate, which would be the John Dean. Just your thoughts on him, because he is the guy that brokered everything.

JM:
It is a fine line. Watergate again, I think was one of those moments in cultural history where the communications media, the press, the news, the TV crossed the line and said, "You know something? We are going to pursue this story. And we do not care whether we find a woman under the bed or a burglar at the door. We are going to take no prisoners. Because we have got to have something for the 11 o'clock news." I think in World War II they would not have done it. They just would not have done it. What, make the President look bad during a time of war? We are not going to do it. But that was that generation. Here we are 60 years later.

SM:
Great. Barry Goldwater again, I brought him up. He has become a big hero in the conservative movement. Just your thoughts on him.

JM:
I remember backing Barry in high school. I do not know whether I passed leaflets out at the polling place or something like that. But I remember closely watching it and I very much liked the man's style. I thought he was an honest, straightforward individual.

SM:
And I am going to finish with just some terms from the, well, one of them is your thoughts on the music, your thoughts on the thoughts on the music of the (19)60s and the thoughts on those musicians and entertainers who were anti-war and the effect that they had on the war itself.

JM:
I think the musicians served as a rallying point because they were so different. I think they were an easy way to grab the audience. And oh, by the way, the change of music style to acid rock drove me to country western in the (19)60s, which as it turns out, was great because my father-in-law happened to like country western music. Of course he did not become my father-in-law for a couple of years after that. I think they were a tool. Again, the media will focus on Woodstock. It is a happening. It is a gathering. It is the 11 o'clock news. We have got something. And again, who went to these? Kids who were almost ready to be drafted or who were drafted. And I still cannot stand. I can stand rap today a little bit better than I can stand acid rock and I cannot stand acid rock.

SM:
Did you like Janice Joplin and Jimi Hendrix?

JM:
Not really. I mean, if I could not follow the music and let us say you are talking to a guy who cannot dance. Let us be honest about this. No, I just thought were, again, they were just tied up with the movement. And who linked them together? The media by accident probably. But it became one and the same.

SM:
The folk singers were very important in the anti-war movement. Joan Baez, Phil Ochs, Peter, Paul, and Mary, the list goes on and on. Holly Near, I mean, there is many of them. Just your thoughts on the folk musicians and Bob Dylan. They were people that really had an effect.

JM:
Again, they were part and parcel of the whole culture. I mean, there was another piece that was, gee, are you a long haired, dope smoking Commie, pre [inaudible] rock musician, anti-war protestor. All that shape. And each new layer was added to that. Did they contribute to elongation of the war? Probably a little. I do not think a whole lot.

SM:
I know at the Vietnam Memorial they have certainly invited some of the musicians or the singers, but that is never been any of the folk singers. Joan Baez at the wall? I do not think so.

JM:
I think he was here in (19)99.

(End of Interview)

2003-11-25

Stephen McKiernan

John Morris

230:02

English

Binghamton University Libraries

audio/mp4

Sound

Audio

Vietnam War, 1961-1975--Interviews; Morris, John--Interviews

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