This is a collection of true stories about the characters and personalities of the folks I met, worked with and fought with while in the Marine Corps from the mid-1960’s to the early-1980’s. There were good guys and villains, heroes and heels. The Best of the Best served right alongside the Worst of the Worst.

Read about the challenges of boot camp, advanced infantry training and general military subjects school; the loneliness, heartache and horror of service in Viet-Nam and the subsequent nightmares that haunt the sleep of veterans for decades after returning to the real world; surviving the administrative sabotage practiced in the junior enlisted ranks; the politics and intricacies of getting along in the senior enlisted ranks; the frustrations and satisfactions of leadership at the platoon level; the willing praise from senior officers who gladly gave credit where credit was due; and the character assassination attempts and backstabbing methods of senior officers who were almost psychotically jealous of junior officers who possessed superior talents and abilities.

This was real life in the Marine Corps, raw, open and unadorned, back in the good old days when survival meant simply that, sometimes, the good guys didn’t win, didn’t get the girl and didn’t ride off into the sunset. And, despite all the excitement, adventure and romance, not all stories had a happy ending.