Clarion Defender_1967-08-10

VIET NAM Every youth must face the fact of involvement PHOTOS BY ROBERT J. ELLISON E VERY Negro youth in the U. S., whether he be a sharecropper on a cotton farm in Mis– sissippi's Delta or an undergraduate pursuing :;tudies toward his bachelors degree in the · cloistered halls of Harvard, has something i1 common with his brothers in addition to the color of his skin-he faces involvement in one way or another with the war in Viet Nam. According to the law of the land, every youth of 18, regardless of race, creed or color, must register with the Selective Service Sys– tem of the federal government and hold him– self ready for a call from his local draft board. What happens after he is called to service can vary greatly-but it seldom docs. Despite the example set by heavyweight boxing champion Muhammad Ali who refused to step forward to take the oath after being drafted and despite the preachings of Stoke– ly Carmichael and Dr. ;\Iartin Luther King against any involvement in the Viet Nam war, most Negro youths do what their fathers have done before them-they sign up, go into the forces and, as Department of Defense records can well attest, serve bravely and with honor wherever they are sent. That many have not followed the example of Champ .\1uhammad Ali is understandable. Best friend of the Viet Nam GI is the helicopter pilot. Copters take men out on missions, supply them with food and am– mnnitiun, give fire cover when they are pinned down and take the wounded to hospitals. Here Ken and his bud– dies meet and unload evening supply heli– copter (right and below). Despite Ali's money and prestige, he is facing five years in jail and a $10,000 fine. "!\lan," said one Negro draftee when asked why he ac– cepted service despite discrimination against Negroes in the U. S., ''I'd rather take my chances in the Army than spend all that time in jail." The high cost of litigation accompany– ing any attempt to beat the draft also miti– gates against a Negro youth's legally escaping sen·ice-even when he may have legitimate grounds for e:-.emption. Despite the fact that some 70 per cent of Negro youth called by their draft boards are rejected either because of illiteracy or physical defects. Negroes are seeing military service in Viet Nam at a greatly disproportionate rate– while Negroes make up only ll per cent of tlw U. S. population they are providing 23 per cent of the fighting forces. The reasons for this arc numerous, includ– ing the fact that, proportionally, the Negro population is much younger than the white ( ~egro male median age is 20.4 years and the white male is 28.2). Negroes also provide only a little more than four per cent of the draft-deferred college students and unemploy– ment among Negro youth is so critical that many enlist to escape the boredom and defeat of slum ghetto living. \1any reenlist rather than return to substandard homes in crowded slums. It boils down to the fact that for many Negro youth, military service with its regi– mentation and all its danger, is a better life with more promise than they can find outside. Pfc. Ulysses C. Kendall whose Viet Nam life is pictured on these pages, is, in many ways, typical of the Negro Cis fighting loyally for their country in the rice paddies, jungles and swamps of South Viet Nam. An artillery RTO (radio-telephone opera– tor), he volunteered to work with a line infautry company where with FO (forward observer) 1st Lt. Charles Szekely, 23, of Tren- , CLARION. DEFENDER - · · · ) M · · I t · · ·u g !eared of Viet Con". A helping hand from lieutenant speeds pfc. across waterhol<>. \Vith carhin<> at rcacly. Ken moves mlto,~·•llage ( •:•ght l.t ' 2~,s~e~~ mg ~~~~nor;~~~~:~ aat~:c~ed to 25th Inf. Di~. Joking with dose friend Pfc. Clarence L. Gray Jr., 19 (belnw) , Ken n·la~l's hcfor,· evcmng mea. n.en """'gnet o a cry, s ., ., ton, N. J., and reconnaissance man Cpl. Den– nis Dupuock, ~2, he is a part of a forward observer team which scouts ahead of Com– pany C, 2nd. Bn., 27th Inf. Reg. of the 25th Infan.try Division, the famed "Wolfhounds." Kendall grew up in a slum on the South Side of Chicago. The son of impoverished, deaf-mute parents, Kendall says, "I know what ifs like to eat cornHakes for dinnei." But Ken– dall early determined that he would leave the slums and when he was 10 years old discov– ered his way out. He saw a professional foot– ball game on television and decided that football would get him the college education he felt he must have. In his freshman year at Dunbar Vocational High, he tried out for the team and found out that he was too small. Determined, }le worked for a year to build up his body. He made the team the next year and, by graduation he had won some 20 scholar~hip offers. From high school, he went to Cameron Junior College in Lawton, Okla., where he was named Junior College All-American and then to Tex~s Western U. where he captained the team his senior year, received his bachelor's in elemt·ntary education and married his wife, Lillian. He and his wife both took jobs after his graduation to earn money to send him back to t:ullege to earn a master's degree but the draft board interfered and Kendall soon found himself the fullback on the 24th Inf. Div. Ar– tillery team in Germany. He scored 1.5 touch– downs and two 2-point conversions to win honors on the European All-Army team. His next "touchdown" was in Viet Nam where he recently left a helicopter in a hot lauding zone and was immediately pinned down by machinegun fire. Crawling forward to contact Lt. Szekely so that they could radio for artillery support, he found himself (be– cause of the radio antenna) a prime target. \'laneuvering into the shelter of a rice paddy dike, he finally reached Szekely and the rest of the night they fought from the stinkiug, muddy waters of the paddies. When the fight– ing subsided in the morning, they had to use lighted cigarettes to burn off the leeches. On another night, a sniper's tracer bullet cut a fiery path straight toward his face as he crawled forward. It hit jmt inches in front of him and ricocheted over his head. Kendall is a good soldier (he's been rec:om– mended for promotion) and believes he knows what he is fighting for. "We're fighting for a cause over here," he says, "both to protect the U. S.-in the long run-and to protect the rights of the South Vietnamese people.... We're also helping to rehabilitate the people. . .. We've never had a war on our home– front, and these protesters would change their tune if they could see how these people have to live because Of the Viet Cong." He also recognizes that the treatment of the Negro at home can have an effect on the Negro GT in Viet Nam. But he feels that inte– gration in Viet Nam must also have an effect upon civil rights back home. As he puts it, "You just can't live in a foxhole together, drink out of the same canteen, cover fire for each other and then go back and say 'go to hell.'" Going home this fall, Ken will be one of the some 15,000 Negro soldiers who return from Viet Nam each year. How the U. S. as a whole treats these returning Cis will have a lot .to say about how much racial progress will be made in the post war years. A tearful lot clutching a gift of C-rations (left) hates to Sl'e his friend getting ready to leave. In full gear (above, left) . Ken thanks Vietnamese family for their hospitality before moving out into countryside to resume mission. · · ] ) K b f · d D k t lk b t I me as Ken reads letter from wife. Both will be discharged After evening meal, Ken and Gray share can of beer. In native house ( ng 1t , en, est nen upnoc a a ou 10 ld b h h. bl .. on return to States and Ken will be guest at Dupnock's wedding. Says Ken, "If everyone was as close as Dupe and I, there wou no sue t mg as a race pro em.