European Stars and Stripes (Newspaper) - June 19, 1991, Darmstadt, Hesse Special report War. A continued from Page i a. . May have widened the Gulf Between and civilian worlds. A. / m. I. generation after the draft s end military service is no longer a common rite of passage. Millions of americans Don t know any soldiers personally. A. Increasingly isolated from mainstream America today s troops tend to View the civilian world with suspicion and. Sometimes hostility. . /. Civilians Don t want to be inconvenienced with defending the country Quot sgt. Tom. Nicholson grouse one evening As he Rolls a cigarette at an army Camp in the kuwaiti desert. The typical american attitude he says is i ii take the benefits but Don t Send me or my son to War. A Quot a athe War heightened the contrast Between those who. Served and those who stayed Home. Quot a. It is said that people enlisting did t know what they were signing up for yes they did Quot Gen Colin a Powell chairman of the joint chiefs of staff said in an interview among the americans returning from the persian Gulf i think there la be a. Sense of Pride they will be those who went Quot a. . This separation of civilian and Soldier raises a. Questions. Some wonder whether it is healthy for Only professional soldiers to do what president Bush Calls the hard work of Freedom Quot others worry that War can look. Like an easy option to civilians who have never faced a combat. I a ,. While there May be no easy or obvious answers these questions May become More pointed As becomes smaller .a. Typical of today s career Soldier is army col Robert h. Scales or his father the son of a Texas dirt Farmer. the army during world War h and stayed on to become a colonel -. A. Scales himself attended West ,Mamed an officer s daughter . Son fought together in Vietnam Scales daughter will be commissioned As an / officer next year and a engaged to a West Point Cadet we Are isolated we Don t have a lot to the outside world say the 46-year-old chief of a staff at fort so okla a. The nation s 2-miliion Active duty military members Are a self Conta Ned society one with its own solemn rituals its own language it own system of Justice oven its own Quot a system of keeping tune. It 0. A society where distinctions of race sox and class bar under the pressure of authoritarian discipline a at the same time exacts a High Price from those who serve. Long working hours and prolonged absences impose a heavy Strain on soldiers and their families alike. A. a / my husband is on duty 24. Hours a Day and his first loyalty is to ,&Quot says Johanna Derinzy an army wife at fort Benning a. Quot sometimes it s hard to Deal with the fact that you As a family come in second Quot Only a decade ago life confines of a military base might have seemed a spartan existence but improving Garrison life has become a High priority. As a result Many bases have come to resemble an Ideal of Small town America. A. A. There is virtually no crime or poverty. Drug addicts and the homeless Are Mere rumours from Quot the outside Quot within this near socialist Paradise says sgt. Jack Bonds Quot you Don t hardly need to go outside for a Quot . A. W. ,. Quot this is our own separate world and As funny As it. Sounds it s a safer place than the civilian world a says Marine capt. David Rababy who served As an. Intelligence officer in Saud Arabia Quot done to have to worry a about my wife Back Home a she lives on base and Shell be taken care of. You Don t get that if you a it was not always like this. \. In the dark Days after of Vietnam military morale plummeted along with budgets. Ships and aircraft rusted for Lack of framed Crews. Drug addiction and crime ,. Festered among bored troops crammed into substandard a housing. A ,. .,. Several factors were responsible for the turnaround the. 1973 decision to abandon the draft of an All. Volunteer Force the Reagan Era budget Bonanza and the a dedication of career officers who were determined not to leave their beloved military in sad condition. \ 1 col. Andrew r. Finlayson is a stiff backed Beefy Leatherneck who otherwise belies the stereotype of the a typical Marine. -. A a. at 47, he holds two graduate degrees and is fluent in two foreign languages. A highly decorated combat Veteran Finlayson peppers conversation with references. To Plato thucydides and Hemingway. A . A accomplishments Are increasingly common As a shrinking military accelerates Competition for promotion. When Only 39 of More than .4 500 army colonels Are Quot a selected to be brigadier generals Only the Best and the brightest survive.-. And the most disciplined from their first terrified hours. As Academy plebes or Boot Camp trainees fledgling. Troops Are drilled in both obedience and self discipline. Rarely Given quite enough time to finish an assigned task they quickly learn the perils of goofing off a. That inner discipline is backed up by a code of conduct far More demanding than that of the civilian world. Military. A Law still upholds ancient notions of chivalry. Soldiers can be punished for Quot conduct unbecoming an officer Quot and for Quot bringing discredit on Quot there Are a it of army officers who i dislike professionally but i done to know any. Who would lie to to Quot says Scales. Quot i say that we Are intrinsically More moral. We just play by a different set of this regimented environment has enabled to sharply reduce the social ills that afflict ,. Quot there is Little if any racial awareness out Here Quot army sgt Robert Crockett says late one eventing at a bustling Supply base in Al a Sumah saudi Arabia. A Quot Sand storms hit everybody and when the tent is cold no one is warmer than the next Guy. We All want to go Home in one piece and we All want to believe our buddy a whoever he is a would save our life without an thought of race a says Crockett a 39-year-old Black from Washington . A. Decades of discrimination have left their legacy however forty three years after was officially desegregated Blacks make up 23 percent of the. Military s enlisted ranks but Only 7 percent of its officer . But Many Blacks As Marine maj. James a Mcclain feel that individuals Are slowly changing the system. Quot a y a y. Quot Quot a / \ Mcclain grew up in Dillon county s.c., where he. Chopped tobacco and picked Cotton on his father s tenant farm. Following a boyhood dream of becoming a Jet fighter Pilot he found the key to advancement was hard work and discipline not race. Quot being born in America is a privilege Quot he. Says Quot i think we As a people have gotten away from the ethic of hard work and . A. Quot the opportunities Are there for anyone who wants to take the responsibly Quot says command sgt. Maj. Timothy Eldridge at fort Sill. Quot i know for a fact that my career has never been held Back because i m Black. I be worked hard and made it Quot says Eldridge the son of a Texas Railroad labourer. Women who make up 11 percent of Active duty forces also find an increasingly Welcome environment. A Cindy gats is a 28-year-old Marine Captain who grew. Up in a Tough neighbourhood in Queens Quot i done to flaunt the fact that in woman Quot she says at air base in saudi Arabi Quot i hardly even think about key to commanding a platoon of Tough Young marines she says Quot is to keep your physical training scores higher than theirs Quot. As Pope Urban ii discovered some 800 years ago when he recruited the first crusaders to reclaim the holy land soldiers May be drawn by idealism but Are sustained by discipline and camaraderie. Both Are cultivated from the first Day of military life. The reason As has discovered Over the years is that soldiers will risk their lives for their comrades even if the ideals of patriotism fade under Firo at the marines Parris Island Boot Camp recruits Are allowed their first phone Call Home Only after their entire platoon completes its first phase of training a requirement that encourages the Strong to help the weak sgt. Ken Sanders wanted to be in the marines since he was 12 years old. A Quot i was impressed by the Glamour of it Quot says Sanders who grew up in a poor White neighbourhood in St Joseph mo., where he and his siblings Quot were Happy to get one a meal a Day and shoes for school every year Ahe enlisted when he was 17, and soon found in the Marine corps the stable family he never had As a child Quot it s a sense of belonging somewhere Quot says Sanders 24. Quot these Guys Are my Brothers Quot a this Devotion is intensified among s Best commanding officers. Scales recalls the Day 22 years ago when it came time to hand Over his command of an artillery Battery in Vietnam s a Shau Valley. Quot wed been under incredible pressure we d been a nearly overrun twice we d lost 19 killed or wounded out of 55 men and we d been in the ram and mud for six months and we were Down to 28 rounds. The general flew in for the ceremony and i cried and could t Stop Quot. Scales pauses for a few moments and then adds softly Quot this is an emotional business. I love this army the men. You re not Selling shoes Here Quot. A. Such intense bonding further distances soldiers from a . Quot i Don t really have any Finlayson says Quot other than the Guys i was close to in what sustains soldiers like Finlayson is precisely what separates them from the rest of America their military calling v y a. A. A most people live out their lives in quiet desperation Quot he says. Quot their bodies decay and they just rot. Whereas a Soldier his life a and his death in Many instances a has meaning. He Dies trying to accomplish something Quot to Many americans operation desert storm was a Spectator event that required no. More involvement than flipping on the evening news but the Victory has launched the country into one of its periodic infatuation with soldiers weapons and parades this embrace leaves some with a vague sense of disquiet a 1. ,. Scales is concerned that the relatively easy Victory combined with the detachment of most civilians from military life May whet the Public s appetite for More foreign adventure. A. Quot it s kind of grim to say this Quot he say but what makes it probably dangerous in the Long run is that we will get into another of these conflicts and people will see a dead. American on the to screen. And they will think Well yeah he s an american but he volunteered. He asked for it. He s not part of my life Quot Cadet Thomas Gordon on the Parade grounds of the Citadel a military Academy founded in 1842. Marine capt. Cindy gats is one of Many military women who served in the Gulf War. Newhouse news service 3 a we believe in the democratic process and in god a says David Bass a Cadet at the Citadel. . Soldiers patrol the Oil smoked desert of Northern dividing Factor by David Wood Newhouse news service f or a while the lost boys thought they were going to miss the fun in the persian Gulf the tank Crew which called itself lost boys Quot was assigned the supremely unglamorous Job of guarding the 2nd army Cav regt s rear the clerks and Cooks following far behind the attack. But shortly before the cease fire their unit a crested a Ridge and saw before it some three dozen iraqi armoured personnel carriers manned and armed. Staff sgt. Carlton Jones tank commander i yelled at the Guys to Back up. We were a Little too dose. My Crew was already loading rounds gunner sighting on the targets. We went ahead and did the . ,. None of the iraqi vehicles fired Back All were destroyed. There were no survivors. Quot combat was great Quot enthused Jones. 29 from Midland Texas. There just was t enough of it i Don t envy the people who did to come Here and experience this. America and its soldiers Aren t supposed to enjoy War. But the adrenaline Rush of combat the camaraderie and sense of shared valor Are the experiences that indelibly distinguish those called ,. -. / Quot the Vietnam War to me was the one great Lyric passage of my existence. Nothing else has had As much meaning or As much satisfaction says Marine col. Andrew r Finlayson. Who won two a Bronze stars and a purple heart in. Three.-years�?T, commanding a Rifle company and leading Long Range patrols deep behind enemy lines. Quot i Felt sometimes similar to when i was in. when i was a kid says Finlayson an administrator at the Pentagon who tried in Vam to Wrangle an assignment to the persian Gulf the adrenaline gets going and you have a bios dust that s an honest feeling i Quot there is an exhilaration to combat says air. A Newhouse news service 2 have flown into the jaws of the enemy. And Defeated him a says air Force col. David Sawyer. Force col David Sawyer a 47-year-old forme. Mormon missionary Sawyer is an affable a-10 lighter by Moor Pilot a who How two combat Tours in Vietnam putting a Maverick missile into a tank Anda. Seeing that sucker blow up especially one that s coming toward Friendly forces us to know you re doing some Good. A it s hard Tor people not m this kind of business continued on Page in Page ii b the stars and stripes wednesday june 19, _1 go a the stars and stripes b Page Iii
