My dad, who contracted malaria on Guadalcanal and took bamboo bomb shrapnel in Vietnam, said the worst war was that fought in Korea.

They called it the Frozen Chosin but make no mistake: it was no Disney movie. It was frigid. Frostbite casualties were high. Socks disintegrated and, my dad told me, Marines urinated on their hands to warm them.

This was not a long war, lasting three years. But it was brutal.

A year from now, we'll note the 70th anniversary of when American forces came to the aid of pro-western South Korea. Seven decades later, the 38th Parallel still divides the country.

And if it became "The Forgotten War," we are fully aware of North Korea's global threat today.

Extreme cold not forgotten

Last week, Hospice of the Big Country, through its association with the We Honor Veterans program, brought Korean War veterans together for dinner, a presentation on the Korean War Veterans Memorial in Washington, D.C., and a crisp flag-folding.

The Washington memorial will note its 25th anniversary next July.

One veteran was in a wheelchair. Another rose slowly when introduced. Two wore Korean War caps. Another veteran said he was prepared for service in Korea when the war ended by the Korean Armistice Agreement.

These aging men were much younger when they ventured into something they never could imagine. From West Texas to a place where the average January daily high temperature is below zero, well ... we can't imagine.

This was the cold war.

Dean Acheson, who served as secretary of state, once said this of Korea:

“If the best minds in the world had set out to find us the worst possible location in the world to fight this damnable war, the unanimous choice would have been Korea.”

The United States entered the war without hesitation. Remember, the celebration of the end of two world wars quickly was tempered by fear of communism.

President Truman said: “If we let Korea down, the Soviet(s) will keep right on going and swallow up one (place) after another.”

The U.S. and Soviet Union faced off, and an unlikely location was Korea, part of the Japanese empire that went up for grabs after World War II.

When North Korean soldiers invaded South Korea, the ante went up in the political poker game. Eventually, China became involved.

It seems so long ago and so very far away. But a week ago, there sat men who had been there.

Meet the boys

Johnny Greenfield (Army), Ron Diener (Army), Clifford Hollis (Air Force), Art Viertel (Army), Terry Smith (Air Force), Claude Boyd (Marine Corps), Paul Brown (Air Force) and Clifford Archa (Army).

When his name was announced, Boyd went into Marine mode.

"Semper fi," he said, clearly. Heads nodded appreciatively. Once a Marine, always a Marine.

Together, these were the Great Eight, this 11 July 2019.

Annelle Harris also was there, representing her veteran father (William Brown) as I did Mathew Jaklewicz. Spouses, too.

And Vanna Hollis, with her grandfather, Clifford.

"He is super proud of his military service," she said. He was a mechanic in the Air Force for 23 years, serving in Korea and Vietnam.

I was seated at a table with Diener, a former Reporter-News employee whom I'd known when we both were much younger.

Diener was training for duty in Korea when the armistice was signed in July 1953. He served in the Army for two years, then in the reserves.

He ran a good operation at the ARN, from 1972-1989. He would've been tough to handle in Korea.

Two more came home

According to the presentation, 5.8 million Americans served, with 36,574 killed and 8,177 listed as missing in action, with 7,747 U.S. military personnel unaccounted for. Considering we lost about 58,000 in Vietnam, which stretched 20 years, the numbers are astonishing.

Yet, the eight men honored last week made it home and joined the Greatest Generation in building our country.

Greenfield served from 1951-52. Just checking, sir, but was it cold?

"You can't believe how cold it was," the Snyder soldier said.

I asked him if he was offended when the war was called "The Korean Conflict.'

"When someone is shooting at you and you're shooting at them, it's a war," he said. He was in the 4.2-inch mortar company of the 2nd Chemical Mortar Battalion. That sounds ominous, considering how we view chemical warfare today. But, he said, the name went back to World War I and later was changed as did its duty, he said.

He returned from the war to join the Texas National Guard to fulfill his military obligation, he said. He worked for 40 years in the shoe business in Snyder.

With Diener at my table was Smith, who was in Korea from September 1952 to August 1953, he told me. Like Greenfield, he was a West Texas boy, graduating from Sweetwater High in 1946. He saw the war from above, flying his P-51 on missions to secure targets for bombers.

He signed up to serve, figuring he'd get drafted anyway. He served for 15 years, getting his pilot training at Reese AFB, then in Lubbock.

After his service, he worked for the FFA here and also flew for First Financial, he said.

Why we remember

Hospice Director Angie Lane said the program is a small way to do something for the veterans who did so much for our country.

Last year, World War II veterans were honored. Next year, it will be those who were in Vietnam.

This weekend, we'll remember those who flew to the moon and walked upon it. They gazed back at a planet that looks so beautiful and peaceful from 239,000 miles away.

Neil Armstrong rightly is an America hero. But so are our men and women who trudged across a land as inhospitable as the moon with much less fanfare.

Twitter: @GregJaklewicz

Greg Jaklewicz is editor of the Abilene Reporter-News. If you appreciate locally driven news, you can support local journalists with a digital subscription to ReporterNews.com.

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