"Landing, when the plane hit the ground, everybody was up on the seat[s], jumping up and down. The stewardesses, 'forget it, there is nothing we can do about this.' I will never forget that."
"[We] got on buses to Fort Lewis. Went through some of the training grounds at Fort Lewis and machine guns [were] going off and training . . . everyone was holding onto their seats. We know we are home but — I never forgot that either."
Veterans coming back from Vietnam had a very different experience than other veterans coming back to the States in prior wars. With tours of duty usually lasting a year, when one soldier was returning from Vietnam, another was shipped off to fight. Paired with the unpopularity of the Vietnam war, there were few welcome home parades.