KOREA: LUCKY

 

          

My father was lucky. During the Vietnam War, and as a Captian in the U.S. Air Force, he was sent to Kwangju, Korea, instead of Vietnam, for a thirteen-month tour. The U.S. Air Force base in Kwangju had about 700 Americans with a small PX that carried a lot of Japanese stereo equipment, but little in the way of food items. Mom had said that the base could best be described as a group of corrugated tin shacks, huddled together on a wind-swept plain. But my father was lucky to be there. And, even though the base didn't have housing for dependents, my mom and I joined my dad in Korea and we lived in an apartment on an American missionary compound. That was lucky, too. But my father, a Detachment Commander of the U.S. Air Force Office of Special Investigations (AFOSI) at the Kwangju base, didn't wear a uniform to conceal his rank. And that wasn't the only thing he concealed. He was against the war. Both my parents were fervently against it. 

On the military base, there was a rivalry between those who were drafted and those who were career officers. They didn't mix. My father was drafted, and, of course, my parent's crowd looked like they had been plucked from the cast of M*A*S*H (and sometimes acted like it too). Their friends were Jake, Larry, Neal, Ike, Mac, Gus, and Gip. They partied, pulled pranks on each other, and rode motorcycles. There were stories, too, of "stealing" military vehicles, which my father wasn't involved with, by-the-way, but my mother was. 

For me, I loved going to the base, it meant eating American food and getting lots of attention from the servicemen who were missing their own children back in the States. Sometimes there were big base functions like on the Fourth of July or Labor Day where they would serve free beer and hot dogs and we'd watch a USO Show. My parents took me to these holiday functions. 

During the show on Labor Day, I had danced and everyone laughed and took pictures of me. Mom said I entertained the troops. So I guess I did my part for the war effort.

                                              Me on the lap of an American Serviceman

In Korea, my father didn't openly discuss his feelings about the war much, since such talk could get him into trouble, especially as an officer. Though my mother was more vocal about it, I believe, according to her letters. If they and their close friends on the base acted rebelliously, it was because they were angry, and rightfully so. I see this period as a dark stain on our history, and I can't fathom what it must have been like back then, whether you were drafted or a military career officer. But, fortunately, my parents were lucky. 

And going to Korea, inadvertently, helped my father get hired later by the State Department. He was lucky. We were lucky. Korea turned out to be the launch pad for all our other adventures from that time forward.