Читать книгу Racing Toward Recovery. The Extraordinary Story of Alaska Musher Mike Williams Sr. онлайн

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I was a private just starting out, but while I was at Fort Ord (which was closed in 1994) I was selected to be a platoon leader. That was a new form of leadership required and again part of my overall education. It was a very, very good experience. Between the leadership school and the army I was making a lot of friends from around the country. The interesting thing is that to go to South Korea I had to go back through Alaska. I flew from California to Seattle to Anchorage and then on to Seoul.

While we were fighting in Vietnam the army had a large presence in South Korea. And all of these years later there is still concern over the DMZ between South Korea and North Korea left over from the Korean War. That goes back to the time when I was born.

It was not a high alert operation at the time, though. It was peace time in Korea, though not in Vietnam. There was some tension at all times wondering about missiles being fired between the two Koreas. We were looking at the “Honest John” rocket missiles and we had ongoing training in case North Korea fired missiles. We were there for defensive purposes. There was always concern in the military about the whole peninsula area. At that time China loomed over things. There was always the feeling that China was North Korea’s ally and that if something happened China with its huge population would get involved. I don’t think that would occur today.