Today we salute the remarkable Rick Rescorla, national treasure and casual Brit-American hero. To begin with, WRSA ran this touching meme:
Next, y’all might or might not be familiar with this book, which I’ve owned for years and re-read countless times:
And now, the rest of the incredible story.
We Were Soldiers Once…and Young: la Drang – The Battle That Changed the War in Vietnam is a 1992 book by Lt. Gen. Harold G. Moore (Ret.) and war journalist Joseph L. Galloway about the Vietnam War. It focuses on the role of the First and Second Battalions of the 7th Cavalry Regiment in the Battle of the Ia Drang Valley, the United States’s first large-unit battle of the Vietnam War; previous engagements involved small units and patrols (squad, platoon, and company sized units). It was adapted into the 2002 film We Were Soldiers.
The cover features Lt. Rick Rescorla, a British-American Vietnam War veteran who served for both countries during the war. Rescorla was uncomfortable about being portrayed as a war hero and chose not to read it when he saw that its cover featured a combat photograph of him. When he learned that the book was being made into a film starring Mel Gibson, he told his wife Susan that he had no intention of seeing it, as he felt uncomfortable with anything that portrayed him or other survivors as war heroes, commenting, “The real heroes are dead.” Rescorla later served as the director of security for Morgan Stanley and is credited with saving nearly 2,700 lives during the September 11 attacks, dying in the process.
Ladies and gents, there walked a man indeed—a true-blue lionheart of a sort they just aren’t making any more of these days, to all our sorrow. Rest ye well, Leftenant Rescorla.
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There are truly amazing men, and yes Rescorla is one and a genuine hero.
I read the book. Highly recommended. The movie is excellent IMO.