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Guest Column

Here's local hero for Veterans Day parade

By J. DAVID PHILLIPS
Published November 10, 2006

Every year at the Veterans Day parade, we have some great unknown former officer presiding over our events locally. I have a suggestion: Why not honor one of our own?

We have a man who has lived in Citrus County since the late 1980s and is a not-so-well-known hero of the Vietnam War. Seldom does he talk about his exploits, but I understand he is just being modest.

A child prodigy, he graduated from high school at 16.

He then attended Cornell University, graduating with honors as a physicist engineer, moving on to Harvard Business School, earning his MBA in record time as well. While attending Harvard Law School, he became a member of the Navy. During his summers, he flew crop dusters all over the United States and "could tell the different brands of castor oil, by their taste."

The Navy found out about his prolific ability as a private pilot, and sent him to fly F-4 Phantom jets, which he jockeyed around Vietnam for 4½ years. He is a five-time holder of the Military Order of the Purple Heart and a lifetime member of DAV.

He was instrumental in the hanging of machine guns on the huge, tanklike bird, and proved that the gun smoke of the Gatling gun would snuff out the big bird's engines. One can only wonder how this all happened.

He also developed a technique of cruising around the target area with one engine turned off to conserve fuel and increase loitering time in the patrol area.

His first duty station was his father's last, the carrier Intrepid, cruising around Yankee Station off the coast of Vietnam. Other ships he served on were the Forrestal, and the Constellation.

He roomed with and knew future senator John McCain on the Forrestal. He was the leader of the A strike force that had just left the ship when McCain's plane loosed the missile starting the fiasco that killed more than 160 sailors that day.

He was awarded two Navy Flying Crosses.

Once, after consuming copious amounts of beverage, he intimated to me what he did to earn one of them.

"They were short of pilots to fly missions in a particular craft, so I asked, 'Does it have wings? A propeller? An engine? I can fly it.'" So he went off doing ground support missions.

One of the other pilots was shot down, so he landed in a rice paddy, and picked him up on the fly. What a man!

I do not know what he did to earn the other one. I am not privy to that story. He also visited his best friend while on one of his forays in-country on the ground. Rode shotgun on a convoy for the Army to the fire base where his friend was stationed.

Ambushed along the way, he fought alongside the Army and helped win the day. There are many other stories, but I am certain everyone gets the idea.

With all of these exploits now told and brought to light, surely he should be recognized for the man he is? I am sure he would be too modest to relate them to many others, but those of us who know him well, know of these stories.

I would like to nominate Kennedy Smith Jr. of Crystal River for grand marshal of the Veterans Day Parade. Why go outside Citrus County when we have such bravery locally?

J. David Phillips, formerly of Beverly Hills, now lives in Brazil. Guest columnists write their own views on subjects that they choose, which do not necessarily reflect those of this newspaper.

[Last modified November 10, 2006, 07:16:26]