Daniel Butler

The Cold War spawned the Korean and the Vietnam wars. There were two Vietnam Wars, the French Colonial War, which ended at Dien Bien Phu in 1954, and the American version, which began to collapse after the politicians who had already bungled ten years of blood and treasure cut off military support to South Vietnam in 1973. Vietnam and the 1960s sparked the American drug culture, a moral decline, the politically-induced entitlement mentality, and throwing God out of Uncle Sam’s public schools.

Dan Butler was commissioned as a second lieutenant upon graduation from The University of Tennessee in 1966. His first duty station was Fort Campbell, Kentucky, but he was soon deployed to the Republic of Vietnam where he served two tours of duty with the 101st Airborne Division, and two tours of duty as advisor to the South Vietnamese Army. Dan Butler was a patriot.

Dan saw extensive combat with Northern I Corps, including operations in the Quang Tri and Thau Thien provinces. He participated in numerous operations in the A Shau Valley, and fought through the 1972 Easter Offensive.

The Easter Offensive, March 30 to October 22, involved some of the most vicious fighting of the war. It caught the Allies by complete surprise. Additional problems involved the ineffective capabilities of some of the ARVN units. Lieutenant Colonel Phan Van Dinh surrendered his 56th ARVN Regiment following a brief skirmish on Easter Sunday. Additional cowardice would hamper the Allied war effort.

The NVA attacked on several fronts with massed artillery fire, accompanied by hundreds of Chinese tanks. Dan was west of the Imperial City of Hue at the time serving as advisor with the 1st ARVN Division, considered to be the best in the South Vietnamese Army. Soon everyone was fighting for their lives. Massive bombing and B-52 strikes leveled the jungle for miles. Thousands of NVA were blown to pieces. The stench of death in the tropical heat became horrendous.

For some odd reason the communists halted after they achieved their initial objectives. They did this more than once. Otherwise they might have overrun South Vietnam had they continued the fighting. The North lost approximately 58,000 killed and 60,000 wounded, but the battle which drug on for seven months was a tactical victory for Hanoi. ARVN losses were 10,000 dead and 33,000 wounded.

Returning home in 1973, Dan was assigned to Tactics at the US Army Infantry School. He left there in 1976 for advanced studies at the US Army Command and General Staff College at Fort Leavenworth, Kansas.

Subsequent years saw tours of duty in Canada, Europe, and the continental US with assignments to the Office of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, 4th Infantry Division, 8th Infantry Division, and the Army National Training Center at Fort Irwin, California. Dan attended the Army War College 1989-1990, and returned to Fort Leavenworth to serve as School Director at the Command and General Staff College.

My cousin retired from active duty in 1993 at the rank of colonel. Dan followed a second career in the defense industry for almost twenty years. Presently he resides in Leavenworth, Kansas, with his wife Maggie. They have a son and a daughter.