Quote:
Originally Posted by Pio1980
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I wouldn't say noone wants the medal, it's just that noone wants to get killed or maimed, except for a few psychos perhaps.
There's the old "Million Dollar Wound", that's the one that's bad enough to get you sent home permanently from the war, but not bad enough to leave you with any permanent damage. The problem is that there is a narrow window. Too much one way and you spent a couple of weeks in the hospital and then get sent back into combat. Too much the other way and you end up with missing body parts or worse.
When I was in Nam there was a policy where if you got three purple hearts you got sent home from the war. Of course that wasn't an issue for me as an REMF but I heard stories about guys in the bush that would wait till charlie lobbed in a few mortars and take out their P-38 (that's a GI can opener) and cut a gash on their arm or leg (or if they were squeamish, have their buddy do it) and claim they got nicked by shrapnel and get a "cheap heart" as it was called, for it. Three of those and you got a ticket home.
Even though I voted for Kerry I always found the fact that he managed to get three of these "cheap hearts" in a little over four months for a ticket out of the war, as a little suspicious.