Vietnam Voices: 'You're always listening. That's one sound you'll never forget - the incoming'
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- Опубліковано 23 вер 2015
- Vietnam War veteran Ralph McKinney talks about his experiences. McKinney couldn’t decide what to do after graduating from high school and attending college. A guy he knew had been in the Marine Corps, and he thought the work sounded kind of exciting. He joined the Marines in September 1964.
Hi, I am a 73 year old Vietnam Combat Vet (1966 to 1969) USS Providence and In Country at "Monkey Mountain" by Danang. I am on VA Disability from exposure to Agent Orange. I enlisted in the US Navy when I was 17 years old. Three of my High school friends were killed in Vietnam, I was spared. Participated in the TET Offensive 1968.God bless all Vietnam Vets. You are not forgotten.
thank you for your service sir. my grandfather is also a Vietnam war veteran. he was in the US navy and due to his exposure to agent orange he's now disabled with parkinson's disease... god bless you and your family💖
You say the USS providence,is this
some kind of ship.Are you the sob
that dropped that shit poison on us.
You deserve what you get!!
@@apolonioramon7089 ?
@@smwrbd
Agent Orange:
This shit was dropped on us.The planes
sprayed us with it. It was done with
planes from land and ships.
Now,you know!! This fu-kers screwed
our health,and now we can't walk our
children were born deformed,and all because of this rear m.f.
@@apolonioramon7089 did he say he was a helicopter pilot spraying agent Orange? No...so quit ragging on him.
Who else likes to listen to vets on the weekends with there morning coffee good way to start the day
*their morning coffee.
Yep! let’s make the coffee while listening to another amazing vet life story
@@bristal1000 Yes! Let’s start our day with a cup of coffee and a D-Bag like Darryl being the Grammar police ruining other people’s mornings! Starts the day off right 😜
@@bristal1000 was
@@Lidge218
* Happenstance
Very humble guy. Seems like he suppressed a lot of his life. This production probably helped him. Two thumbs up.
My dad did two tours, and he is the deadliest man I know.....
I love these stories. Beats the brakes off anything Hollywood puts out.
One has nothing to do with the other.
@@spaceghost8995 They are both entertaining stories. These just happen to be true, and better. I’m not sure what point you were trying to make. I’m not saying these stories are made up. I’m saying they are better than the movies.
@@spaceghost8995 Except for the fact that the sacrifices made by the veterans helped to secure the freedoms the Hollywooders and the rest of us enjoy.
@@randykelso4079 LMAO
Love hearin it from the mouth and none of that censored bullshit from mainstream movies / hollywood
God bless all Vietnam vets and their families. You bore the burden without complaint. You are all heroes and deserve our utmost respect.
The man is right about job assignments to boots back in the day: they were tested for aptitudes and assigned their NEC or MOS according to their abilities. I believe that is better for the country and better for the individual than giving the youngster a choice in the matter. When I went through boot camp in 1962, the detailer had me fill out my "dream sheet". I was clueless as I looked at the puzzling list of rates and picked out the three choices that (to me) sounded like one of my passions: auto mechanics. I later learned that all three choices were "deck rates". The detailer looked at my test scores and said "I think you would be better qualified for the technical rates within aviation, but to get into aviation you must initial here to volunteer. So I did. I had been told by the recruiter that I could not be in aviation or electronics because I'm colorblind. But, like the man being interviewed, at boot camp graduation I was issued orders for Aviation Electronics School. Go figure. It turned out to be the break of my life and I retired at 55 after thirty-some years working as a civilian in the field of aviation electronics. No regrets.
Awesome story. Thanks for sharing this!
That nervousness of not being used to being on camera in the beginning of a lot of your videos, before they get comfortable speaking, captures the expression they're trying to articulate perfectly. You wouldn't want to corner this guy.
Bad ass gramps
What?
@@ham7357 Great man. Americas finest. Thank you for our freedom
I think its scrambling through the memories and trying to figure out what to say and having answers when questions ar being asked. Because I'm sure it was crazy. This guy right here done been through some shit. For sure.
Thank you for your service sir. Welcome home
Humble, with incredible outlook. You have to admire this man.
This guy has a great mindset. In the last few minutes of the interview, it really shines thru. People could learn a great deal from this man.
I was also there, I also left about when you did in 1967 after the Dong Ha ammo dump got hit. I was also 2nd platoon sgt. Where I extended the perimeter to the road, then I went to Suicide Hill Across the road from the ammo dump. I was Tip Top Alpha. Before Dong Ha I was also in CUA Viet, great place. Also Gio Linh”yikes”. Our fuel dump also got hit. My first tour was mostly DaNang, Tam Ky, and Kham Duc. 65-67, Sgt. Long
I enjoyed hearing his story. Much respect for all who served over there
Alot of things go on behind the scenes to keep things moving and running during wartime. Fighting a war isn't just pulling a trigger, this guys job was vital. Thank you for your service
He's a genuinely good person. It would have been nice to see the photos that he brought.
TOTALLY agree!
UA-cam would remove the video if any pictures were deemed offensive.
@@johnnybbgunner2136 the first amendment doesnt care about offending someone
I've said it in the past and I'll say it again. This is some of the best, real stuff to watch, listen, and learn on, here on UA-cam, period.
Thanks for your service everyone please remember the ones that didn’t make it back home!!
I'm happy the interviewer is knowledgeable about the subject he covers. Welcome change of competency.
Interesting fellow, thanks for your service Ralph. Well done.
Hey Billings Gazette, thank you for putting these men's stories online, so they can be saved for history. Too many experiences go to the Graves with these men. I'm glad your giving them a louder voice to let the future generations hear it in their words, from their mouths!
THANK YOU RALPH !
These men were just built different
Semper Fidelis, Sir, and Thank You.
Thank you for your service! Semper Fi!🙏🏻🇺🇸
Watching these interviews is way better than tv or movies! Just amazing! Thank-you! This man is a great dad you can tell! Awesome!
My tradition is to listen to as much as these as possible on memorial day
I started my Vietnam journey as a Forward Observer for an Infantry Company about 30 miles Southwest of Hill 55. I did that for 7 months and then went to an artillery unit on a mountain top. We had 7 generators and I was the only one that could keep them operating. We had two 1.5K, two big generators that were 400 cycles that would run our computer and we had two 5Ks and one 10K that supplied all the power for the entire LZ. I went on R and R in August of 1969 and when I got back all the generators were dead except for one of the computer generators. It would run a light bulb but it was dim. It would not run a fan and when you are living in a sand bag bunker you want a fan. All of them had been hit by mortar fire and fixing them was hard but after about a week I managed to get them all running again.
Thank You Sir 🙏🏽🇺🇸
Thank you for doing these interviews.. our great grandchildren will appreciate very much seeing the stories from the men that were there.
Thank you Ralph!
Thanks for your service to our country mr McKinney . Glad you made it back. I find your experience relatable for some reason. Based on this interview, I think you and are have similar personality traits. Optimist in spite of all your faced with and a sense of curiosity as to how things work. 🇺🇸
Thank you for your service!
One thing! Ralph was throughly prepared! Wonderful interview. Thanks and welcome home soldier!
Marine
Thank you so much for your service!!
Thank you for your service Sir! I appreciate you as do many Americans. God bless!
Thank you for sharing your life with us in this video and thanks for risking it for this country. I pray you find or have found peace in your life. Blessings.
Thank you.
God bless him a very honest and descent man
Thank you for your service Sir
Thank you for your service
As a fish in the Corps of Cadets at Texas A&M in 1980 we learned to use an iron to heat/cook food in our “holes”. I always wondered who figured that out.
ALL THESE STORIES AND EVERY SERVICEMAN ARE OUTSTANDING ❤❤🖤🖤❤❤💜💜
Been to both places he was stationed at. During my time 55 was 5th Marines and An Hoa was 7th Marines.
Tk you sir for your service. Which this generation had the brass balls you all had.
Amazing conversation with a most excellent man 👍🙏
Thank you sir for sharing your story. It’s so cool to see a legit pair of “Ho Chi Minh” sandals.
Dam! My uncle sent me a few pair of those HoChi sandals when I was a kid. My dad had a few pair that he wore until he died in ‘08.
Those eyes..
Thanks for your service, I also worked forty years for the phone company with techs that started as Marine radio techs, you seem so well adjusted.
It takes courage! Thank you, sir
Such a great resource and tribute to the millions of Americans affected by this war over generations. Thank you.
This man speaks the truth. No embellishments.Semper Fi!
all this mans friends went on to own a business, or mastered a trade. so, learn a trade and work for yourself. instead of a “debt degree”... they may be old, but knew how to live a reap American life! godspeed sir!!
Times are totally different now.
@@spaceghost8995 ...but hard work is still rewarding...
I’m from the u.k and I find these interviews fascinating anyone who served in Vietnam I applaud you all !!! The war put sure a high price on American society even to this day I can only wonder what their experiences were through Their eyes only they will ever know the horrors of Vietnam pity that war ever happened 😢
God Bless Thank You for your service.🇺🇸🇺🇸🇺🇸❤️
I’m sure that’s something that never goes away never leaves your thoughts. Thank you sir for your service and sacrifices.
Thanks very grateful for your service
Glad you got home safe... enjoyed hearing your story.
Thank you for giving these amazing men a space to tell their story. This is real history.
Good Man Right there, glad he made it out. It’s good to hear some positive stories from veterans. Thank you for your service.
Thank you so very much to all the men and woman who so unselfishly served and currently serve this great United States of America.
Was at Da Nang 69 - 70 . Went back in 2017....many changes and China Beach is very developed.
Thank you. Welcome home.
Greetings Bro, Was at Phu Cat 69-70 also, the next AFB south of Da Nang
Why did you go back
@@Rollercoaster555 My son was living in Hong Kong and on my visit he surprised me with a trip there.
I really enjoyed it...it has changed so much.
@@yuvegotmale yo Byron thanks for comeback I just figured I would ask.people ask me if I would I tell them no why would I to many painful memories it is what it is we lost that's all I got.best of luck to you in the rest of your life
Thank you for your service and story.
Yes.interesting to hear from the vets instead of someone else telling a story.movies and such.i could listin all day.thank you for going.
Thank you Marine
Thank you to all or you vets
Thanks for your service brother. Enjoy your memories. Welcome home.
I'm a retired USAF Vet. When he mentioned he was on Radio Relay, I too was on Radio Relay microwave and Tropo Communications in the Air Force. It was the best career field in the Air Force because they could put you in any part of the globe to maintain the equipment to keep communication going during peacetime. You could be on a mountaintop far away from the air base and no one would mess with you and play those silly war games on base. Sometimes people on base wouldn't even know you existed on a mountaintop. But it was great and I'd do it all over again. But sadly those communications sites around the globe are all gone and are just abandoned buildings from relics of the past.
Thank You for your service SIR!
thanks for your service pog
Great interview. Very interesting part of our history. Thank you thank you thank you
Welcome Home, Thank you Sir, God bless you ALL 🙏
I don't think Ralph saw enough action for the interviewer.. you can tell he wanted him to say something horrific. It's refreshing to hear the stories of the soldiers that weren't traumatized
He wasn’t a soldier! He was a MARINE!
Stop assuming . When you dont know shit , its better shutting the hell up :)
I was army and always have much respect for marines
Great interview, pretty laid back n realistic...
Many thx
Thank you Ralph
I saw this interview a year ago and think I read somewhere that this HERO of a Marine passed away 2 years ago. If this is true then the angels in heaven were certainly singing amd welcoming home and this earth lost a GEM ✨️ 💞
Ralph is alive and well. I camped with him a few weeks ago. A true hero!
He's got the thousand yard stare. You can tell a lot about the man's eyes he's seen some shit. God bless our Veterans.
He does not have the thousand yard
stare.I know about that.I wish they
would interview me,so they can know
the true life of a GRUNT.
Totally agree
@@apolonioramon7089 ask. Like a man. Don’t wish. GRUNT
@@Hammerback972
I object,you say ask like a man.
What do you know about being a man?
FKY!!
@@cappystrano1
Bull!! Pretenders are a dime a dozen.
Q #1. Bamboo Water
Q#2. Jungle rut
Q#3. Ambush stakeout.
Q#4. How many sandbags to dress a
foxhole.
Do you know the answer's?
I've been serving for 9 years and have been listening to vets talk about ww2, Korean and Vietnam War on my way to work each day to remind myself of what was sacrificed before me. And to learn of their heroing lives
This man has a n. Excellent radio voice.
Glad you made it home Ralph, hope you are well.
This is a good listen/interview, kinda takes you there , in a way ...
I wish OP / producer would list in description his
gear (mics, cameras, etc )
If you see this Big respect to you sir @Ralph McKinney ❤🇺🇸
This was a good one
I wish that the interviewer would have asked these veterans to bring in a photo of themselves from when they entered the service and have them hold it up to the camera while they introduce themselves, if they felt comfortable doing that?
The interviewer kept interrupting the Veteran and seemed quite cavalier to me. I think the interviewer, was afraid he wasn’t entertaining enough, bounced around too much.
Yep I/m out
@@benwinter2420 This guy doing the interviewing has done a lot of it. Don’t agree disagree but he is not a rookie doing the interviews. I think it varies with me frame of mind I’m in Listening to him
Huh - I don't get that at all - I think the interview subject set a pretty affable tone and the interviewer rolled with it. Seems like a very comfortable, informative exchange to me.
@@bryanfields5563 are you a Veteran?
@@markhankins3023 nope, I didn’t have the nerve coming outta high school that men like this one had.
I'm STUNNED to see 69 downvotes for this video. Who ARE those people?!?!!!!
Hunter Biden and the TV personalities who interview him, Immigrants from the Vietnam area, BLM and BIG ((blacklivesmatter & blacksingovernment), Silicon Valley execs & suckups, Democrats, RINOs, Xi Jinping...
People with a brain. All these Vietnam videos are basically BS. These veterans willingly chose to go to an unwinnable, illegal war. If they say otherwise they are promoting a falsehood. A lot of these people push the image that they could or did win the war, but the "politicians" and the "people back home" lost it. Vietnam was a national American disgrace, tragedy and defeat...and they share in the responsibility of it. The politicians and American people saw that the war was not being won, or was unwinnable. The US never really had the "hearts and minds" of the South Vietnamese people...who they supposedly were fighting for. They don't talk much about the war crimes they committed against the Vietnamese....OR even against their own personnel. Lastly, whether these guys won or lost...the Vietnam war had absolutely NO effect on American freedom, security, safety or way of life. They did NOT sacrifice anything for my...or your freedom. These veterans present themselves as victims and wrongly treated. They are big boys and went to a country to kill or be killed. They shared in the failure. Now they want to be recognized for their "sacrifice" through videos, Honor Flights, endless trips to the Wall in DC or to Vietnam itself. They never grew up and really moved on. They have made themselves an embarrassment to themselves and my generation.
What a lovely man and although I’m not American as a British person the stories are so sad with a government selling out their own troops. R.I.P to all that never came back
a brilliant record.
These interviews are compelling and much appreciated. What would make this series even better is if you got in contact with soldiers from the other side in order to share their stories. One of the things about these interviews that stands out is that most didn't enter the war with a politician's mindset. They were either drafted or felt some abstract need to "serve their country." I would love to hear perspectives from the other side.
Inapproopriate. Most of these soldiers are still fighting that enemy in their minds.
i always wondered how they named the hills... never guessed sea level... thanks for the info and ur service!!!
I always just figured they named them in the order they found them. Nope, sea level it is.
Explains the low digits and why we never heard of a hill2020.
Nice interview. This gentleman is a good storyteller, you can tell he isnt adding any BS to his stories. He would be a good person to have as a friend I think.
Yes, as a former forward observer, meters above sea level is pretty much the number over the hill top, although it became convenient to call them by these numbers, never saw two hills exactly the same height. One of my favs, Hill 701 Ft Irwin California.
Semper Fi brother! I spent 4 in the Corps and 6 in the Army. I’m a disabled OEF veteran. I'll also share something with you. In my Army unit, my 1st. Sgt. was a Vietnam veteran and a girl in my unit was Vietnamese. I use to think, if it was 40 years ago, they would probably have been on opposite sides and possibly enemies.
Top would’ve served with her dad. Most Vietnamese that came stateside were South!Vietnamese.
Love and Respect!
Years on
I wish Mr McKinney all the best
Thank you for what you did, I wish you didn't have to.
I am from Canada I have the most respect for these men all heros that fought and died for there country I could never understand how they were so overlooked they paid the ultimate price I am glad finally they finally being accepted for what they did any vet in any war should should be honored and respected it was not a war Canada was in but you were fighting for our freedom too and I personally thank you for service
They weren't heroes they're survivors.
what a top man and a good man
R.I.P Sonny Rob Newth ❤ lest we forget xxoo.
I feel for them!!!!!!!
We owe all these Vietnam veterans a big apologies for how they were treated when they came back home also there is no excuse for our veterans be homeless our government needs to get off their butts and put our veterans into a living facility for what they did for our country also they both physical and mental health care also these doctors needs to know how to talk with these veterans you have to gain their trust cause only people that the veterans trust is their brothers and sisters who they fought along side with