One of my Jewish Nam experiences

In 1968, I joined the Navy at the height of the Vietnam War. I joined the Navy figuring that my chances of seeing “Action” were very little since I hadn’t heard of any ships being sunk in the war. One suggestion my father gave me before leaving was not to disclose my religion since he had heard of some anti-Semitic problems. So, when I enlisted, I told the Navy I had no religious preference. My dogtags read “NO PREF” where the religion was supposed to be. I later found out that if someone put “no preference”, their names were given to the Jewish Chaplain.

After boot camp, I found myself assigned to Hospital Corps School for training as a Corpsman (medic) and was later assigned to a combat Marine unit in Vietnam. Shortly after arriving with Echo Company, 2nd Battalion, I had a brief situation with a southern Marine who was spouting anti-Semitic comments. According to several Marines who were present, I said I was Jewish and didn’t appreciate any further comments from him. Many years later, one of the Marines who was there, a Puerto Rican, and who had grown up in New York City with many Jews, expressed his admiration for me for defending myself and my faith.

While in the middle of a combat operation, someone came around to our campsite and asked if anyone was Jewish. At first, I said nothing: not knowing what was going on and I couldn’t figure out why anyone would want to know who the Jews were. Several Marines redirected him back to ‘Doc Bo’, (me). He asked, “are you Jewish”? I replied, “yes”. He then said, “grab you gear and come with me!”. I was loaded on to a helicopter but I was not told what was going on, just that I was going to DaNang.

I landed in DaNang and was instructed to go over to a large tent that was located near the runway. As I walked up to the tent, thoughts were flying through my mind as to what I would encounter. I pulled back the door flap and first things I noticed were the many military guys in nice clean uniforms. They were standing around laughing and talking. Boy, did I feel out of place since I stood there in my camouflage uniform, filthy dirty, not having taken a bath in weeks. Someone approached me and asked if I was in the right place. Yes, I started to explain, but I didn’t know why I was there. As I looked around the tent I noticed a huge table heaped with bagels, lox, cream cheese and every delicacy I could remember when I thought about the Sunday morning breakfasts I had growing up. Suddenly, it hit me! This was a Jewish Holiday Celebration. In my mind I had expected to see Rod Sirling from “The Twilight Zone” appear and explain this whole experience to me.

Thanks

Ron Bobele

Receiving the Purple Heart