Wrong back then

I was wrong, and admitting that is not easy for me to confess. I was wrong when I didn’t join the voices of dissent regarding U.S. involvement in the Vietnam War. Rather, after graduating from high school in 1964, I enrolled at the left-leaning University of Montana to avoid the draft, signed up for Air Force ROTC, endured much campus unrest and after college completed six years of active duty with an honorable discharge.

With no depth to my thinking, I don’t recall any logical reason for not joining the voices of dissent back then. I identified with and admired President John Kennedy and his family. The much publicized “domino effect” and the fear of a spreading communism proved to be ill founded. South Vietnam has become our trade partner.

Professor Dale Soden’s class of Whitworth University students is spending their “January Term” touring Vietnam. Good! But, how will they ever comprehend the horror of 55,000 U.S. dead and the pain and suffering of the South Vietnam refugees when the U.S. deserted them? But, alas, hindsight is always 100 percent accurate.

Gordon Spunich

Spokane Valley