Title: Roy Benavidez,a true hero Source:
[None] URL Source:[None] Published:Sep 3, 2010 Author:Big Geek Daddy Post Date:2010-09-03 09:58:05 by sneakypete Keywords:None Views:14506 Comments:35
http://www.mishalov.com/Benavidez.html
Poster Comment:
This action happened in Cambodia,not South Viet Nam. Roy was assigned to MACV-SOG's CCS. All the operations were classified as Top Secret and everybody went in wearing sterile clothing with no US insignia or patches,and with no dog tags or ID cards. Our weapons were even sterile,with the serial numbers having been reported as stolen if US weapons,or never logged into the army system if foreign. Not that this makes any difference in this case because Roy went in armed with only a Bowie Knife. I know there has been a lot of talk about John McCain being a hero. Here is a REAL hero.
My God, Roy Benavidez was THE definition of "HERO." Glad Reagan stepped in. RR was right; You couldn't make this up. Not even the Rambo character does as much...and with so little. At 4:11 I'm thinking this ain't ending well...and then there's Benavidez spitting from within his body-bag. WHOA.
It's just so damn depressing to have the man endure only to have the gubmint bust his chops over medical bennies and ignore his past heroics and sacrifice. Is it because he was assigned to a TS detail?
RB waits 13 years for a medal, while Kerry gets....how many Silver Stars for scratching his ass? Even Fraudie McCain is Audie Murphy compared to Kerry.
As an aside, nobody can challenge your balls (or sanity) Pete for doing what you guys had done. Not like you could quit whenever you'd had enough, either.
Q: Did there seem to be an inordinate number of Indian-Americans and Mex-Americans on covert ops like this?
It's just so damn depressing to have the man endure only to have the gubmint bust his chops over medical bennies and ignore his past heroics and sacrifice. Is it because he was assigned to a TS detail?
Yes. In the early days of SOG we even had some guys that were wounded pretty badly not being able to get medical retirement or service-connected VA benefits because "we didn't have troops in Cambodia or Laos". Same thing with valor awards. They were hard to get for a couple of reasons. One was that was a hard group to impress enough to get put in for something,and the other was the citation had to be carefully worded to make it look like it was a part of a action that took place in VN.
Plus,it was hard to make a awards panel for Silver Star and higher awards understand how dangerous SOG operations were because you were behind enemy lines and cut off from getting any help. Bob Howard was put in for a Medal of Honor on THREE separate occasions before he finally got one.
Another problem for the really big gongs was that a special review board of regular army officers at higher command had to approve them,and the regular army hated Special Forces and thought we got too many awards.
And sometimes there were just no logical explanation for not awarding the MoH to a worth recipient. Rocky Versace,who was held as a POW inside VN,just got his MoH award for his conduct as a POW a couple of years ago,and I THINK it was 1966 when he was executed. AND....,unlike Colonel Bud Day,he had at least two former POW's who witnessed his heroics pushing for him to get one from the time they escaped (Nick Rowe) or were released as POW's. Nick Rowe was assassinated by communist Muslim guerrillas in the Philippines and never got to see Rocky get what he deserved. Read the citation below based on WITNESS TESTIMONY and give me just ONE rational reason it took him decades to get his award. I honest to God can't read it without getting teary-eyed,and I have read it dozens of times.
