We graduated the same day as Colin Powell.

Colin was in our same Basic Infantry Officers Course. He was a DMG from CCNY.

Colin finished the basic course in the top ten of our class.…as he says in his book, ”My American Journey” ….“Validating his ROTC and Pershing Rifles preparation.”

The 5 of us felt the same way about ROTC and Pershing Rifles. We all did airborne or ranger training, or both. These things build character.

I finally met Colin at a Pershing Rifles function in Washington, DC about fiveyears ago.

My kids pick on me whenever I mention my attachment to Colin.

I spent 21 years as an Army Infantry Officer, including a year in combat in The Delta in South Vietnam where I received a Bronze star, a couple of air medals, plus three Crosses of Gallantry from the Vietnamese, and The Combat Infantryman’s badge.

Prior to that I went airbone.

We had a 5 man American team, supporting South Vietnamese soldiers wearing straw hats, living in mud huts with their families, carrying wwll carbines, surrounded by the VC, spending most of our time in a Boston Whaler, or with feet dangling from a helicopter.

It seemed at that time, like the right thing to do.

My son Steve honored me with an ROTC scholarship and has since gone ”airborne”, and retired as a JAG officer with 20 years as a reservist. Steve and I are the only father/son “Wash D.C. NCMA Fellows”

Well, Here I go again….As Colin says, “We were trained to close with and kill the enemy”. I’ve used that a lot.

Colin’s experience was a lot different than mine. What I saw in Georgia, in the south, shaped my experience to this day. More than anything I saw in combat. Of course it shaped his also.

Colin almost ran for president, and actually lived to see the election of an African American President. Some progress.

In 1979 I retired after 21 years in the Army. I also worked as a professor of Military Science at the Altoona Campus of the Pennsylvania State University (Penn State). I spent two years on the Faculty Senate, and was given a key to the city.  My toughest assignment was notifying families about their sons and daughters, that were killed or missing in action, in combat in Vietnam.

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