In the summer of 1952, when I was 30, the Army assigned me to an infantry unit fighting in Korea. Meanwhile, though, there was other news in my family: My father had become the Republican presidential nominee. As an ambitious young major, I refused any offers for other assignments.
I do not believe that the children of presidents or vice-presidents should be assigned to combat zones. They have no place there.
The British soldiers serving in Afghanistan alongside Prince Harry were in exceptional danger until he was withdrawn.
You know, my dad was a lieutenant colonel at Ft. Lewis on the 3rd of March, 1941. Fifteen months later, he was commanding a theater of war.
When France fell in 1940, De Gaulle was a temporary brigadier general.
My dad had the greatest admiration for MacArthur when they were working together in Washington before the Philippines. And Dad used to talk with absolute awe about MacArthur's brain.
My dad being an Army officer, I was just born to it. I was raised in a military manner, and it was a given that Army brats went to West Point, so I went to West Point in 1941. And being in the military has been my life.
I was a lieutenant in World War II.
Unlike the Afghans and Iraqis, the South Korean people solidly supported the American military presence, which was part of a United Nations operation.
Avoiding combat duty was and is an unforgivable sin for a professional soldier.
As son of a Republican president, Dwight D. Eisenhower, it is automatically expected by many that I am a Republican. For 50 years, through the election of 2000, I was.
Almost everything else I have done during my adult years has been affected to some extent by my name - by my father's position, if you will. But in the air, I had no name; to the Federal Aviation Agency I was simply Comanche Nine-Nine POP. The quality of my landings, navigation and judgment were mine alone.
