As threat of war looms, veterans
living near Ft. Bragg offer their thoughts
By Jeremy Kirk, Stars and
Stripes
FAYETTEVILLE, N.C. — The jukebox in the Veterans of Foreign Wars Post 6018 here on
Chance Street plays smooth soul classics. Patrons sip beer and occasionally a harder
drink. They have shed blood for the United States in World War II, Korea, Vietnam and the
Gulf War.
And they all bear the scars.
Shirley Simmons — who works in the smoky upstairs bar — remembers the bodies
in Iraq, and she takes pills to stop the rashes from her Gulf War illness. Albert Crosley
received a Purple Heart for being shot in World War II. Timmy Berginer talked about his
Vietnam experience at the prompting of a journalist for the first time he could remember.
It’s at this post on the northeast side of Fayetteville where a healthy debate can
take place on the future of U.S. troops at nearby Ft. Bragg getting ready to deploy —
somewhere. All draw on their ample combat experience and paint a picture of concern for
soldiers heading overseas.
"If I was 20 years younger, I would be there myself," said Crosley, a feisty
87-year-old drinking a cup of beer. "That damn thing [the World Trade Center] was a
monument. Well, I’m too damn old now."
It’s the first time America has seen such as attack on its soil, said Oliver
Coleman, who served in the Army for 24 years including three tours in Vietnam. It demands
a response, even though the effects of war are terrible, he said.
"Being in a war — it’s never easy," Coleman said. "But I feel
like this: When someone comes over here and messes with our freedom, you get a different
feeling. It makes you want to go out there. I’m sick now — I’ve got colon
cancer — but if I could, I’d be more than glad to go somewhere and fight. There
no doubt about it — it was very sad. It’s cold-blooded murder."
Simmons, 49, agrees. She deployed into Iraq with the 82nd Airborne Division with a unit
that dealt with chemical weapons. She’s sure that her illness was caused by exposure
to chemical weapons.
But that doesn’t lessen her support for President Bush’s stance and troops
who may be deployed to avenge the terrorist attacks on the World Trade Center and
Pentagon.
"I tell you, it’s going to take a lot," Simmons said, who retired from
the Army in 1995 as a staff sergeant. "My advice is, be strong and don’t let
your guard down."
She knows. She was shot in the face by an Iraqi soldier and had a would that required
facial reconstruction. But her shot back at the soldier was a kill.
The desert heat was difficult, she said. When she got off the air-conditioned plane in
Saudi Arabia, she fell down as a wave of heat hit her. She remembers sand storms, friends
being killed and poor Iraqi children scrounging for MREs, or Meals, Ready to Eat.
"We didn’t know what it [war] was like," Simmons said.
The U.S. military’s advanced technology has undoubtedly given soldiers an edge,
said Cynthia Berginer, 44, who served in the Gulf War. But the drawdown of the early 1990s
that saw Army divisions reduced, and soldiers now may be rely too much on it, she said.
"I think the politicians have relied on technology to save us, and technology is
not going to do it," Berginer said. "It’s going to take brawn and skills
for leg soldiers.
"It [technology] helped us but it also hindered us in that we don’t have
soldier’s soldiers anymore. We’ve got people with goggles on — night vision
— and people who sit up there like they’re on a Game Boy," she said.
Her husband demurred.
"Those are not soldiers?" Timmy Berginer, a Vietnam veteran, asked. "You
want to go back to the old west days of the Springfield rifle? You take advantage of
technology. If they unleash the technology, there will be no need for ground troops."
The spirited debate ends with laughs at its momentary stern conviction. The concern is
heartfelt — no one wants to see U.S. soldiers die. But unlike other wars — where
there was no direct attack on U.S. civilians — this attack happened in the land these
veterans love and the ideals they fought for.
Before the Sept. 11 attacks, soldiers in the Fayetteville community didn’t garner
a whole lot of respect, Timmy Berginer said. Now, soldiers are patted on the back, but it
took a terrible act before people began waving the flag.
"A lot of people finally realized that it could happen here," Berginer said.
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