The Good News and the Bad News -- War Stories!

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Date Posted: Wed, May 03 2006, 7:20:07
Author: Jeff Northridge
Author Host/IP: dialup-4.246.30.196.Dial1.SanJose1.Level3.net / 4.246.30.196
Subject: The Good News and the Bad News
In reply to: stephan nguyen 's message, "Re: help me find out who my grandfather was" on Tue, May 02 2006, 23:48:13

Howdy Stephen;

It was nice of you to have mentioned that your grandparents met in 1962 or 1963 because that is very important. Officially, the War in Vietnam for the U.S. didn't even start until 8/5/64 (three days after the Gulf of Tonkin incident) and the first major ground combat unit (the 9th Marine Expeditionary Brigade) didn't arrive in Vietnam until 3/8/65. Prior to that, there wasn't a very large U.S. military presence in Vietnam (less than a few thousand) and they were all under the command of MAAGV (Military Assistance Advisory Group, Vietnam) whose main purpose was to aid the ARVNs with military equipment and training without getting involved in actual combat except in self-defense.

So, the good news is that there weren't that many GIs at Danang in 1963, but the bad news is that you don't know what your grandfather's name is, what unit he was with, what his rank was, nor even what branch of service he was in. The only military unit that was at Danang that early that I know of was a Navy Mobile Construction Battalion (Seabees), but of course, there must have been others. My only contact with someone who was at Danang that early is Mrs. Phan Thi Bich Dat who provided gift shop and laundry services to the GIs at Danang, but she currently lives in Ho Chi Minh City and is in ill health. She did have a lot of contact with the top brass and senior NCOs as early as 1961.

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Replies:

Suggestion -- Jeff Northridge, Thu, May 04 2006, 16:32:39 (dialup-4.246.30.162.Dial1.SanJose1.Level3.net/4.246.30.162)

Re: Suggestion -- Stephan Nguyen, Thu, June 01 2006, 10:34:29 (www.ggusd.us/206.224.254.17)