10/7/2008
3:38 PM
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feature
Photographs courtesy of Vietnam Veterans Memorial Fund
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the courage to endure DURING THE 1960S AND ’70S, NIGHTLY
WRITTEN BY Christine Techky
Jan Scruggs from Bowie, Md.,
television news programs broadcast the horrors
served in the 199th Light Infantry
of the Vietnam War right into the living rooms of
Brigade and was decorated for
Americans, and since then, authors have penned
gallantry in 1970. Scruggs recounts
many books questioning the validity of United
that “people who are undergoing a
States’ involvement in that war.
military experience in a time of war
Yet one aspect of the conflict that received
face difficult situations, but they are
little attention was how, just as in earlier wars,
shared experiences and a closeness
soldiers serving in Vietnam formed strong bonds
emanates from those experiences.” He
with their comrades—some were short-lived
adds, “As time goes on you develop a
(literally), and some remain to this day. Below,
bond, and being under stress, you
three Vietnam veterans share some of their
naturally feel close to each other.”
positive memories and willingly recollect the
Scruggs particularly recalls fellow soldier James Mosconis, from Florida.
wartime experiences, the two men
soldiers.
“We were on patrol,” he recalls. “We
became close buddies and forged a
had tanks with us, and the battle was
friendship that continues today.
underway. Mosconis took cover behind
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survived and, because of their shared
camaraderie they shared with their fellow
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After the war, Scruggs undertook
a tree but took a bullet.” During that
graduate work at the American
same battle, on May 28, 1969,
University in Washington, D.C., where
Scruggs was also wounded. Both
he published a paper on post-traumatic