News
Street Roots • Nov. 10-16, 2017
Age: 87.
Service: United States Navy. Lieutenant,
junior grade. Served on a destroyer in the
Pacific Ocean near Korea
Did you see any combat at any of the
places you went? What was that like?
Islands, for a thing called
Operation Castle. You know
about Bikini and all the atomic
bomb tests? We were in
Operation Castle, which was
the 1954 hydrogen bomb. The
hydrogen bomb in ’54 was four
or five times bigger than the
engineering people, the
scientists, had thought it
would be. We were about 20
miles away from the bomb
site - Blast Bravo. Blast
Bravo was about a thousand
times bigger than the bombs
dropped on Hiroshima or
Nagasaki. What happened,
unfortunately, was the
weather: Wind was blowing
from one space which was
safe on the lower stratosphere, and
the upper stratosphere was going the
opposite direction, and the atomic
debris fell onto all of us and the Marshall
Islands. The islands had to be evacuated.
Our ship was the most heavily radiated
ship ever in the history of the Navy.
Some of our crew were burned. I wasn’t
affected, but I’ll tell you, the bomb blast
was ... spectacular.
What was it like?
Frightening. It turned night into day.
One of the nicest experiences in life is
Everything was illuminated. We weren’t
to be shot at and missed.
supposed to look, to turn away and (use)
goggles, but you had to look at some
Do you remember what some of the most
point. You would just
difficult parts of the war
think, “Anybody who
were?
would propose nuclear
The environment was
warfare would be totally
W ii would fust
difficult at times,
demented.”
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especially during the
Where were you? I ’m
winter. Being off the coast wb® w o « li propose
»«clear warfare
assuming you were inside,
of Korea in the winter was
because you didn’t get
like being in Nome,
would be to ta lly
Alaska, or something. The
burned.
wind came out of Siberia.
I was on the bridge. I
We had salt water freezing
did not get burned, but
on the topside of our ship,
some of my crew mates
and it was really
did, who were exposed. We had wash
miserable. I took my hat off to those
down systems, kind of like sprinkler
carrier pilots that were flying during
systems, to pump salt water on the ship
World War II in those carriers, which
were not really designed for jets yet.
exterior to wash away anything, and we
Occasionally we’d have some experience
used that. The Navy wasn’t very good
where there would be a loss of life: Not
about that, about (the) aspects of atomic
on our ship, but a pilot shot down, or
radiation exposure, for a long time.
maybe one of the mine sweepers had hit
People were suffering, and not just in
a mine. There were some difficult times.
(the) Marshall Islands and so forth, but
military people down in the desert that
Do you have any specific memories that
were exposed to some of those atomic
stand out to you?
tests were also suffering. It took a long
I remember the excitement and
time for the Veterans Administration to
challenges of meeting your duties,
recognize that illness that some had had
whatever it was with (carrier fleets) Task
It was kind of like the handling of Agent
Force 77 and 95. Another interesting
Orange in Vietnam. They denied that
thing that happened to us was after we
Agent Orange was a problem, and then
got back from our second cruise back to
they finally admitted it was terrible
Pearl Harbor, we were almost
problem.
immediately sent down to the Marshall
Page 9
They had no record of whether they were
in prison, or whether they were dead. That
really hit me. Of the original planes that
took off, only 50 percent of them ever came
back - the bombers. We lost a lot of young
boys flying those airplanes. Every morning
I’d see the planes take off, and go over to
bomb the oil fields. At night, we’d see the
planes come back. We never counted them,
but we (know) their casualties were huge.
Do you think there is anything the general
public should know about war?
I think the general public should know
that it’s people like you and I that are
killing each other, and it’s the big
manufacturers that started the war.
(They’re) the ones that are profiting from
it. Just think of all the airplanes that Boeing
sells. Just think of all the rifles that
Winchester sells. Those companies cause
war. You and I don’t cause wars. I’ve met
German people over there that supported
their soldiers, just like we supported ours.
The fact that we’re killing each other, that’s
Age: 97
the biggest crime there is.
Service: Maritime Service as a radio
I feel people all over the world are the
operator, Army, trained as mountain ski
same. All they want is security for their
troops. Europe
families, they want a home to protect their
What were some of the most difficult
families, they want a job so they can
moments during service?
support their families. It’s the same all over
the world. Why are we allowing the
When you’re face-to-face with Germans,
politicians to put us in war? I look right now
and they’re shooting at you, and you have to
at our president. He is not doing anything
shoot back. It’s either they’re going to kill
to prevent a war. He’s just showing off and
you, or you’re going to kill them. I have an
doing what he wants, not what he feels the
aversion to killing people. I tried to wound
nation should want. We don’t want war.
them, but sometimes you can’t. They’re
We’ve spent money we should’ve spent on
shooting right at you, right at your face,
education on buying fifty-million-dollar war
(and) you have to shoot back, and you don’t
weapons. One of our fighter planes costs $4
know whether you’re going to kill them or
million to $5 million a piece. Just think
not. That is the most horrible thing to me. I
what we could do for our education, for our
have a conscience, and I still have
kids in school, if we’d spent that money on
nightmares about that.
education. I am very, very angry at all of
our politicians. Big money buys them off,
When did you learn about German prison
and they vote for things that they want.
camps like Auschwitz?
That’s what’s so bad. I grew up a
We knew what was going on while we
Republican but I am not OK with what the
were there. After the war was over, I was
Republicans are doing now. I think it’s all
still in the hospital. They brought in a lot of
wrong.
the American boys that had been in prison
in Germany. They were starved almost to
death. They brought them into the hospital
I was in, and some of them were so thin
they couldn’t lay them on a bed. They used
straps and suspended them from the
ceiling. One of the nurses that was
supposed to take care of these boys fainted
when she saw them, and then she refused
to go in that room again. I would walk by
and I should’ve gone in and talked to
them. All they could do was - their eyes
would follow you. They were so far gone;
they were merely skeletons. It was
horrible looking, the look in all of those
American prisoners they brought into
the hospital after the war.
I knew what was going on. I went to
the graveyard where all of our boys
were, the 50 that got killed the first day.
G.M.D on the cover of
And there was something like 500 airmen
Camp Hale magazine.
that had gone out and never came back.
G.M.D.