I don't want any romantics to go into the military. I'm not a pacifist. I think we need a military, and the better one we have, the better off we are. I don't want kids going in there thinking that it's John Wayne on Iwo Jima. That's not healthy.

When the peace treaty is signed, the war isn't over for the veterans, or the family. It's just starting.

In the military I could exercise the power of being automatically respected because of the medals on my chest, not because I had done anything right at the moment to earn that respect. This is pretty nice. It's also a psychological trap that can stop one's growth and allow one to get away with just plain bad behavior.

Everything is touched by the holy when it is in the presence of death.

Quitting is unthinkable and pain is just weakness leaving the body

The Marine Corps taught me how to kill, but it didn't teach me how to deal with killing.

Vietnam was the first time that Americans of different races had to depend on each other. In the Second World War, they were segregated; it was in Vietnam that American integration happened in the military - and it wasn't easy.