Reflections on 1966

Tuesday night my wife and I flew into Oklahoma City after a week visiting relatives in Southern California. We were getting our luggage about 10pm when I saw a group of young army recruits being hustled to buses waiting to take them to Ft Sill for basic training. Young eager recruits going for training to fight Mr Bush's & now Mr Obama unnecessary war in Iraq. As I watched them go by my mind drifted back to August, 1966 and another group of new recruits, including me, boarding an aircraft for a flight to El Paso and basic training at Ft Bliss to fight in Mr Johnson's' unnecessary war in Viet Nam. A big difference was that we were a mix of about a third National Guard, about a third volunteers and about a third draftees. These young people going to Ft Sill were all volunteers..amazing how things have changed. My memories were made even more poignant by the fact that my wife and I had visited the Murrah Federal Building that was bombed on April 19, 1995 that previous Thursday. I was inducted into the army in August, 1966 in that same building and I stood in about the same place where I took the oath of alegience to preserve, protect & defend the United States almost 43 years earlier, WOW!! May God bless and keep those young recruits as they are transformed into and become part of the US Army...one of the greatest group of soldiers in history.