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Students get history lesson on Vietnam War from veteran

Staff photo by JIM REED

Armwood High history students recently experienced a firsthand lesson from John Kieffer as part of an effort by Bay-area Vietnam veterans to share their knowledge with students.

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By RUSS CARDWELL

The Tampa Tribune

Published: November 10, 2009

SEFFNER - They went on night patrols wearing helmets and full field equipment. They learned how to throw a grenade and dig a trench. They were involved in a deadly nighttime firefight and got as close to action in the Vietnam War as they will ever get.

And they did it all from the safety of a local classroom.

Armwood High students in Bruce Burnham's Vietnam War history class recently experienced a firsthand lesson from John Kieffer as part of an effort by Bay-area Vietnam veterans to share their knowledge with students.

"I felt maybe I could contribute," said Kieffer, a 59-year-old former Army rifle platoon leader who was stationed near the Demilitarized Zone from December 1969 to December 1970. "Virtually all the kids are excited to hear about our experiences and are eager to participate," he said. "It validates my experience in Vietnam.

"When we came back, there were not a lot of parades," he said. "Now, for the first time, people want to hear my story. And it's meaningful for the other veterans. It's a personal thing."

Burnham, 57, also a Vietnam veteran, began teaching the class at Armwood in 1998, the same year the Vietnam Veterans of America, Chapter 787, speakers bureau began. Sixteen high schools in Hillsborough County now offer the course.The war was fought from 1959 to 1975. Two U.S. servicemen were killed in a guerilla attack the first year, and more than 58,000 would die. In 1968, the deadliest year, more than 16,000 Americans were killed. About 350 servicemen from the Bay area — and 2,000 from Florida — died in Vietnam.

By comparison, about 5,260 troops have died in the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. Of those, 248 were from Florida, with 57 from the Bay area.

Kieffer, who speaks at three or four events a month, joined the speakers bureau about nine years ago. It was not an easy decision, he said. "Would you get up in front of 30 strangers and talk about a traumatic experience?" he asked.

The payoff, though, has been worth the effort.

"Veterans' eyes light up, and they get a sparkle when the students show interest," Kieffer said.

"The first decade or so after the war was rejection," he said. "It was the first war we lost, and veterans were swept under the rug. But in the last 10 to 15 years there has been a resurgence in Vietnam culture. There was a resurgence in academia. The students interacting with me have now become a part of that experience," he said.

Another reason for speaking up "is for friends lost," Kieffer said. "It's very significant for the people left behind." He lost a best friend, a newlywed with an 18-month-old child.

Bill Cummings, a University of South Florida history professor who teaches a class on Vietnam, has some theories about the renewed interest in the war.

"It's a personal interest," he said. "What I've heard from students, especially young women, is that their fathers fought in Vietnam and they wanted to know what they went through. That and the comparisons they are hearing between Vietnam and Iraq. Those are the two reasons that have caught my ear," he said.

"It's very popular," he said of the class. "I try to offer it twice a year, and it always fills up very quickly.

"There is so much mystery about Vietnamese culture, but mostly what students are interested in is the American experience," he said.

Kieffer provides that firsthand experience, cramming a year at war into a one-hour class. His leadership skills were on full display for the Armwood class as he made assignments and asked and answered questions with machine-gun rapidity. He told students how a platoon works and described life at the DMZ. He outfitted student Jeff Prelich as a radio telephone operator and showed the class how a wounded soldier is treated with the bandage he carries in his gear.

Kieffer was sometimes blunt: "Anybody who is killed, it's not a critical thing to attend to them," he said. "They aren't going to get any deader."

His descriptions were colorful. "This will actually stop a vehicle," Kieffer said, holding up a .50-caliber machine gun cartridge.

Graphic details — he told of a Vietnamese soldier taking a .50-caliber cartridge under the chin, "and the whole top of his head was gone" — drew gasps and groans from students.

As he described a firefight, Kieffer drew on a board to show where the dead and dying lay. He told of a wounded Vietnamese soldier being shot because there was a great danger of the soldier blowing himself up along with anyone trying to aid him.

Charlie Harkins, a veteran in training to become an instructor, spoke briefly about the injuries he received at the Battle of Khe Sanh during some of the fiercest fighting of the war. Forty years later, it is still hard to talk about the war, Harkins said.

"I was shot three times," he said. "An enemy rocket came in and almost blew off my leg. I spent two years in a hospital recovering. Doctors thought I was going to be paralyzed. I'm basically a medical miracle," he said.

Life on a battlefield is full of extremes, Kieffer said.

"It can't be tense all the time. There are hours and hours of boredom interrupted by moments of sheer terror," he said.

To emphasize that point, Burnham, Kieffer's accomplice, popped a balloon behind the class, drawing shouts and nervous giggles from the students.

There were moments of levity, too.

As Kieffer drew KIA on the board and explained that it stood for Killed In Action, he paused. "KIA — that's a car, right?"

"Kia!" someone shouted.

"Vietnam veterans don't drive those cars," said Burnham, drawing laughs.

The class concluded as Burnham took a photo of Kieffer surrounded by his platoon for the day.

"Say, 'Infantry!' " Kieffer commanded, as Burnham snapped the memento.

Platoon dismissed.

Copy editor Russ Cardwell can be reached at (813) 259-8415.

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