the war can ever tell a accurate story about the war. Ken Burns came very close. But I developed a belief over the years since the war and it is this: History is very seldom written by those who lived it and the truth become what the majority belief it is.

I have read many times on this board that something I know to be true "has been debunked." The truth about the war even here is what the majority says it is.

Thee biggest falsehood I read concerns the anti war movement and that the left never mistreated returning vets. So the truth that is accepted has been politicized so it its neatly into our left vs right frames of mind.

Another is he average age of soldiers in Vietnam. I was 19 when I got to Vietnam. I could not drink or vote but I could die. 38% of the deaths in Vietnam were 19 to 20 years old. There is no real valid statistic of the average age but many of my buddies were my age or a little older.

E8-E9 were the ancient ones, in their 30s or 40s.

When you got to Vietnam at age 19, wasn't that old enough to drink in Vietnam? I was stationed in Germany at 19, and that was old enough to drink there.

For history written by someone who lived it, We Were Soldiers Once ... And Young, by Gen Harold Moore and Joseph Galloway is a vivid account. I don't know about its accuracy, but it's probably far better than the movie "We Were Soldiers", a ripoff by Mel Gibson.

If you were old enough you got a new card every month. Most guys did not drink gin and I would ask for their old ration cards that still had gin available, I drank a lot of gin and 7up.

But then, I was opposed to putting the WWII monument on the Mall. Up until then, we didn't have war memorials on the Mall. In fact, the committee that had been formed to determine the location had decided on a place along the Potomac, but then someone higher up walked in and said, "No, it's going to be on the Mall."