In 1968, John O'Connor had been living in Alaska for a year, working for a farmer, then on a fishing vessel, and then at a logging camp. When he met an ex-Marine, back from Vietnam, who'd hitchhiked up from Florida, John was very impressed: "I was impressed with him, and I was impressed with the fact he'd been to Vietnam, and I was impressionable. I was nineteen years old. Plus, I'd always wanted to go into the Marine Corps. Not cause I'm a killing machine or anything. But, I kind of, believe it or not, wanted to go to Vietnam, just to see what war was like. I didn't want to kill anybody. I just wanted to be around it, and see what it was like."
He didn't see a TV or a radio the entire time he was in the Alaskan wilderness, so for the most part, he was unaware of the extent of the anti-war movement, unaware of the protests against the war. "I didn't realize there was so much backlash against the war until I actually joined the Marine Corps." It wasn't until he was in boot camp, back in the lower forty-eight, that he started reading up and learning about the anti-war movement. "It was kind of late then," he says. "I was already in it; I knew I had to do my time."
John went to the main Marine boot camp on Paris Island, South Carolina. "As soon as I got off the bus at Paris Island, you've got your bus full of recruits, civilians, and the first thing they say isÉ a DI walks on the bus, right where you stop, at main headquarters. He's a big guy, in my case, a big black guy. 'All right, you A-holes. The last one off this bus, I'm gonna beat his a-s-s.' That's the first thing they say to you. And guys are pushing and shoving to get out of the way. You realize, wow, everyone's in it for themselves. That was when I realized how I'd messed up. And it hadn't even started yet."
"It's a total physical and mental nightmare. Best way to describe it. They would make you do physical exercise until you couldn't possibly do it any longer. And you were completely broken down. A lot of guys cracked up. Went a little wacky."
He tells the story of a recruit the drill instructors didn't want in the platoon: a thin, young boy, seventeen years old, whom the DIs knew wasn't cut out for the Marine Corps. They locked him in a wall locker and pounded on it with sticks for an hour, called the medical Corpsmen, and told them to bring a stretcher and straps, because they had a crazy Marine. Just before the Corpsmen got there, the drill instructors let the recruit out. "And the kid was completely shattered," says John. "They just strapped him in and hauled him out."
John himself suffered abuse in boot camp. "I was beat up. I was punched, hit, kicked, hit with rifle butts. Knocked so hard against a rack of beds [that] I knocked over two metal, double bunk beds, the Marine Corps racks. Which is hard to do, you can't even move them. The Drill Instructor hit me like a football player out of the blue; I didn't see him coming. I didn't even know what I did wrong. I weighed 140 pounds, 145. He weighed about 230. Hit me out of the blue, as hard as he could. Ran at me and slammed into me. Another time, another Drill Instructor punched me in the gut as hard as he could, then I doubled over, then he hit me in the face. Totally brutal. Just total brutality."
The desperation to escape boot camp drove some men to extremes. One man bayoneted himself in the stomach. As he lay on the floor, "all the DI did was swear at him," John says. "They didn't even try to help him. Eventually, the Corpsmen came and took him away. It was overkill. It was just too tough."
Now John is a State Veterans' counselor with the Veterans' Administration, and he helps men who were in the military, who were mentally or physically injured. He deals with mostly Vietnam vets, but also veterans of the Korean War, some World War II, and a few Persian Gulf. He files claims on behalf of the vets against the Federal government, and he says a lot of the claims are from the vets' boot camp experiences. "It was total torture. Some guys were harassed so badly, they just broke downÉ they just broke down. They just never got over it. They keep telling themselves, 'How come I broke down and the guy next to me didn't?'" He says of boot camp, "It sounds real gruesome, and it was. One of the worst experiences of my life."
After that, there was Advanced Infantry Training, and then a two week period of training for requisition and supply, where he "basically learned to type." After that, four weeks of jungle school at Camp Pendleton, California. "That wasn't too bad. I mean, it was physically hard, but they weren't down on you. Because they knew you were going to 'Nam. And they wanted to be your friend in case you were out in the jungle. Different story then. Because in Vietnam, everybody's got M-16's and rounds and rounds and loads of ammunition. So 'Nam was a different story. People didn't come down on you. They'd be foolish to do that."
In June, 1969, John was stationed on Hill 81, south of Da Nang, working in the supply tent, requisitioning supplies. "And I pretty much stayed there," he says. He was only in the infantry for about a month, but he says, "it was long enough for me to know the war was totally wrong." "We were constantly getting rocketed and mortared at night. The rockets would come in and hit the hill and blow up, and mortars would come in and start hitting the hill, almost always at night. These people, they called them sappers. They were North Vietnamese specialists that could come through the concertina wire. It would be strung around the perimeter of a hill, and they would come in, and they were naked except for maybe a loincloth. They'd have satchel charges, explosives, strapped around their waist. And they could come through this wire in four seconds, five seconds. They'd come in, blowing up things all over the place.
"Aside from that, I was really only in one shootout when I was out in the bush. During the shootout, I got my eardrum blown out, by the Marine behind me, actually. He opened up with his machine gun, almost killed me. It was at night. And all the fluid came out of my ear, my left ear, and I thought I got hit, because there was liquid all over my face. But I didn't feel anything, except my head went into an echo chamber. I lost my equilibrium, because all the fluid drained out of my ear, and I fell into a drainage ditch and basically lost my rifle. So I never really shot my rifle. In a way I was lucky, because, if I knew today that if I shot my rifle and blew somebody away, I probably wouldn't feel that good about it. So in a way, I feel like I'm lucky. I feel like I'm really lucky.
"When the North Vietnamese Army guys were running around the hill, blowing up things and blowing up hootches, I didn't shoot, because it would have been really easy to kill another Marine. Because the VC were running all through us, and it was night. It was always night. They would shoot up flares, and there would be shadows. You could see somewhat with them, but they create a lot of weird shadows. So as the flares were coming down, the shadows would all move, and you wouldn't know who was who. It was really hard to tell if it was a friend of yours. A lot of times, people would be yelling out, 'Hey, Billy, is that you?' Just trying to identify each other. I just told myself, 'It's crazy. I'm not shooting. I'm not going to blow somebody away.' So I just never really shot. I also never really saw any VC. There was only one time I saw a VC, and it was just as we were going on patrol at night. The sun was going down. He jumped up, actually, almost right in front of me. Almost like he got flushed out, like a pheasant. He had his back to me, and he didn't have a weapon. And he ran through this field. Me and this other guy saw himÉ Jones, it was actually Jones, this big black guy who blasted my ear off with his machine gun later that night, but he'd only been in 'Nam two or three days. I'd been there a few months, and I was already kind of burned out on the war. He said, 'What're we gonna do?' and I said, 'Just let him go, man. I'm not gonna shoot anybody in the back.' I was glad that I made that decision."
For the most part, the rest of the Marines didn't share John's views of the Vietnamese people. "I have kind of a different take on the war. As soon as I got off the plane in Vietnam, the first thing you see is how poor the people are. They are so poor, you just can't believe it. The people are just very humble. They're really nice. And right away, I saw the way the Marines were treating the South Vietnamese, the people we were supposed to be fighting for. I mean, a lot of these Marines, they were big rednecks. A lot of them, 6'2", 6'3". And the Vietnamese are like, 5', 5'3", very small. I was just pretty much upset from the time I got there 'til I left. I never participated in any of the stuff those guys did. As a matter of fact, I got into a couple fights with guys.
"This mama-san, older Vietnamese woman, would come up and offer to wash your clothes for fifty cents for a week. It was a good deal. So she came to our hill. I usually gave her a dollar, you know, fifty cents was nothing. So, I usually gave her a dollar; she was really thankful for that. So, my bunkmate, he was from Florida. Again, I use the word redneck. He was from the swamps of Florida. Nothing wrong with that; it's just his attitude was really redneck. So I gave her the dollar, and he goes, 'What are you, a gook lover?' And he says it in front of her. I said, 'Hey, why don't you just mind your own business?' Paul Ray was his name. And so then he looks at the mama-san, and he goes, 'Hey, mama-san. Where's your daughter? I wannaÉ F. her.' So I said, 'Ray, why don't you just shut your mouth?' This went on and finally I just couldn't take it anymore. And he just kept it up, on purpose. Now, I'm not the kind of person who starts trouble, ever. But I just jumped on this guy, lost my mind, you know. We ended up out in the dirt, rolling around outside. Some guys pulled us apart. He never said that again."
Another incident occurred while John was going into battle, riding on the back of a truck, heading towards the fighting. "So we're riding out there, it's just getting to be dusk. And we're all in this truck, about 20 of us, standing up in the back of this open truck. This Vietnamese girl, teenager, was riding on a bicycle down the road. Pure white... pure white outfit. I don't know -- their clothes were so clean. They lived in these dirty, swampy areas, but they were always so clean. So one of the guys took a big rock that was in the truck and threw it at her, hit her in the shoulder as the truck was going by. And she fell off the bike and into the rice paddy, looked like she was hurt. But, you know, the truck wouldn't stop, there's no way. There was a whole bunch of trucks. So he's there, laughing. He goes, 'I got her!' and more stuff, and he's laughing about it. I just freaked out and said something to him; I forget what I said, but I used the F-word, you know? And he stopped, he goes, 'Hey, what's your problem, O'Connor?' I just said, "Don't ever F'in do that again.' He goes, 'What're you gonna do, man?' and all this. And I had my M-16 fully loaded, you know? And we were going into a fight, we were going into a battle. And so he goes, 'Hey, cool down, man. Just cool down, man.' But I just couldn't cool down. I wanted to kill this guy.
"I think the main thing isÉ when one person thinks that they're a lot better, or more powerful, or, I don't know, superior to anotherÉ I guess I'm talking races now, like the white race, and then the Vietnamese, to lord over another race of people is just so totally wrong. When you see it, firsthand, the way I saw Marines treating the Vietnamese, so bad. It just made me realize how arrogant a lot of people are. Some people think they're just better than other people, and that's just wrong. Just because the people are smaller, more diminutive, doesn't mean they're less than you are. I guess that's the main thing I got from the warjust the attitudes of people who think they're better than other people, and really have the power to lord over other people. When they do that, it's totally disgusting. That's the main thing I learned in Vietnam."
During his one month in the infantry, John was stationed at Fort Observation Post Barracuda. "I was with a tank unit, attached to infantry. The VC would booby trap, or a mine would knock track off a tank that would be out in the bush. And then the tank would be down for the night, in the middle of the jungle, with four guys on it. And it wasn't a very healthy situation, because it took forever to get extra track out into the bush. So you'd be down for a few days, just waiting for track to come, so you could move. And the VC knew you were stranded. It wasn't a good situation. And also, these B-52 bomb craters were immense. They were like lakes, like ponds. So huge, were the B-52 craters, especially in the bad areas; they were pockmarked all over the place. The tanks would try and maneuver through them, get around them, get down; then they'd get stuck in these holes, and then couldn't get out of there, either. It wasn't the best place for tanks, unfortunately. So, they took our whole unit back, in September 1970, we came across the Pacific Ocean on a ship with our tanks and our unit. But when we landed, in California, they wanted us to make a beach landing. There was a bunch of Marine Corps generals on the land, and the Marine Corps band playing the Marine Corps anthem. We had just been in 'Nam and everything, at that time we weren't very patriotic. We were a little burned out. And the front of the ship dropped down, and we were supposed to run out and make a World War II type of Marine Corps landing. The guys I was with, anyway, we didn't take much stock in it; we didn't believe in it at that point very much at all. So we just kind of walked in front of the generals. We didn't salute them. I had never even seen a general. Our sergeant was down on us: we didn't show enough respect and this and that, but like I say, we were kind of burned out by that time. Maybe three hundred feet away or so, there was a chain link fence, and somehow, these civilians found out we were gonna make this landing. There were a bunch of people there, anti-war protestors, and they were yelling, waving signs and stuff, and asking us how many babies we killed. So it wasn't very pleasant. Then I was released from the Marine Corps about three days later, and like I say, my friends and IÉ we weren't very patriotic at that time. And we went down to the beach the day we got out of the Marine Corps and had a big party on the beach and basically emptied our duffel bags out into the middle of a bonfire and burned the whole damn thing. Then we basically got on planes back to our hometowns and waited for our hair to grow in so we didn't look like Marines anymore.' John says he didn't talk to anyone about being in Vietnam for twenty years. 'You know, if you eat of the fruit of the poison tree, you're guilty. It was like that. Didn't even want to be associated with it. So I just never talked about it."
Now, working with veterans, John sees the effects of the war: "A lot of the guys who have problems from Vietnam, they were forced into a situation where they had to kill somebody or do something against their normal will and then they come back to the StatesÉ and at the time, it's almost accepted. It's like a different society over there. And then when they come back to the United States, they get married and have kids, and all of a sudden their kids are growing up, and then they realize, 'Geez, you know, I killed a kid the same age as my son.' And only because, under orders, they had to do it. Or be killed themselves. There were a lot of instances like that. A lot of situations like that happened to guys in Vietnam, where they had to kill somebody, disable somebody. And then later, they felt, 'What did I do this for, why? For the Vietnam War? Which was a total waste?' And then they have mental problems, unfortunately, because of it. And they deal with it their whole lives. It's always just that split second in 'Nam, when they made that decision about what to do. They always want to go back and change it. And they run it through their minds continuously. They don't tell their wives or their kids about it. They just live with it. They don't tell anybody. And it just works on you, makes you wacky after a while. And then other guys just saw too much combat. You see a bunch of people killed, and it just gets to you. This is the kind of stuff you keep inside. And it just works on you. You either start drinking a lot, or abusing drugs, abusing your family. Or you become very isolated; you don't have any friends. You just go to work, come home, and that's it. You don't really have a life other than drinking or doing drugs. You don't have any goals or aspirations. The majority of the guys, their problems are based on guilt. You know, what they did in the service. That's a big part of it.
"I'm not a patriotic person. In my work, I deal with people who are very patriotic, believe in the American way. But I'm not like them. They're real gung ho, they're still living it, you know. Like, the military experience was the main experience in their life, and they talk about it, and they go to the American Legion, and the VFW, and Vietnam Veterans' groups -- it just holds no interest for me, whatsoever. But these are the people that I pretty much deal with, everyday, at my job. That's fine, you know, that's their thing. But they want you to feel the same way they do. And they don't like it when you don't. So I kinda walk both sides of the line. I respect everybody who comes in my office. And no matter what their position or station in life, I give them my full attention, and I do whatever I can for 'em, as best as I can. Unless they're a total A-hole. Then I have to set them straight and say, 'Hey, stop. You're going over the line there, guy.' But you get a lot of angry people. They see you across the desk in a suit and they figure you're the bureaucrat, you're the guy that never did nothing. But then when they find out I was in Vietnam, they cool out. Then they feel like you're one of them. So, I try to be friendly to everybody, respect everybody, in the office, when they come in." On his identity as a vet, John says, "There's the right way, the wrong way, and the Marine Corps way. I guess in that way, I'm not a typical Marine. Most people, once a Marine, always a Marine. Not me, though. I kinda burned my uniforms when I got out."
"I learned a lot," he says. "But I would rather have played music."