Vietnam: A Distant Memory

This is mostly my story. I wrote it as historical fiction in order to take some artistic license to make it more readable. Some of Vietnam was not readable and you can be sure there is much that wasn't written here. I just couldn't do it. If I've done my job well, you won't be able to tell what is fiction and what is not. Be assured the fiction is minimal. I arrived in Danang and the airbase went immediately to a red alert due to rocket attack.
Welcome to Vietnam. Riding YFU boats in the Literage division, delivering cargo up and down the coast of northern South Vietnam and accepting TDY assignments to a Special Operations group that didn't exist. The missions we did never happened. After ten months in Danang, Nixon's Vietnamization program sent me south to Cam Ranh Bay and from there the Freedom Bird brought me back to the world. Ride along on both sets of missions, some mundane and some not so much.
Clearly, I express the frustration being a veteran of a war that nobody wanted. We did our duty. Whether you agreed or not, you blamed the warrior for the war, and that is wrong!It wasn't only those of us who served directly in Vietnam, the disrespect was meted out to anyone that wore a uniform in that era. A whole generation of military personnel who could not express their pride in serving our country.
This country should be ashamed of itself for the way we were treated. It was a rude return and the country still hasn't made honest amends. Vietnam divided the country in the 60's and 70's, and it still divides it today. Those from the 60's and 70's would just as soon forget it ever happened; those of us who served there will never forget. We left Vietnam, but Vietnam did not leave us. This is but one of the millions of stories that could be told and it has taken me 40+ years to write it.
Though I live through it every day, thankfully, Vietnam is a distant memory.