"War. Huh. What is it GOOD for?"
The title of this blog comes from one of many protest songs that were popular during the Vietnam War. The song is "War", which was sung by Motown artist Edwin Starr. As you can see in the video, there are scenes from the Vietnam War accompanying the song. I remember those scenes. They were broadcast nearly every night on every network channel. Even though my father was a load master in the Air Force on the C-131s and C-141s during the Vietnam War (dropping troops, supplies, guns and ammunition in country, taking the dead and wounded out), I rarely dwelled on the possibility that he might not come home one day. That was simply too much for me to handle at that time. At the height of the Vietnam War, my family, which consisted of my parents, Richard and Mary Shortt, their oldest child (me), my sister Tamara and my little brother Ricky, were transferred to Clark Air Force on Luzon Island, the Philippines. I was eight years old when we arrived, and ten years old when we left....