ARMED FORCES DAY

[A Life Aloft]

President Harry S. Truman led the effort to establish a single holiday for citizens to come together and thank our military members for their patriotic service in support of our country.

On August 31, 1949, Secretary of Defense Louis Johnson announced the creation of an Armed Forces Day to replace separate Army, Navy, Marine Corps and Air Force Days.

Marines:

Battle For Fallujah
The six-week battle was the fiercest during the Iraq War and the deadliest urban combat for the Marines since Vietnam. Almost 100 Americans died; 600 others were injured. Eight troops who fought in the battle received the Navy Cross, the military's second-highest award for valor in combat.

The three-month battle for Okinawa was the largest, costliest operation of the Pacific War.

The Battle of Khe Sanh began on January 21, 1968, when forces from the People’s Army of North Vietnam (PAVN) carried out a massive artillery bombardment on the U.S. Marine garrison at Khe Sanh, located in northwest South Vietnam near the Laotian border. For the next 77 days, U.S. Marines and their South Vietnamese allies fought off an intense siege of the garrison, in one of the longest and bloodiest battles of the Vietnam War.

 

[A Life Aloft]

The Navy

The Battle of Leyte Gulf, formerly known as the Second Battle of the Philippine Sea, is generally considered to be the largest naval battle of World War II.

The Battle of Midway was a crucial and decisive naval battle in the Pacific Theatre

 

[A Life Aloft]

The Army

Battle of the Bulge. United States forces bore the brunt of the attack and incurred their highest casualties for any operation during the war. The battle also severely depleted Germany's armored forces on the western front which Germany was largely unable to replace. German personnel and Luftwaffe aircraft also sustained heavy losses.

Vietnam

Desert Storm

Afghanistan

 

[A Life Aloft]

The Air Force

Korean War

Vietnam

Iraq

Afghanistan

Libya

 

[A Life Aloft]

Coast Guard

Vietnam

WWII

Rescue Missions

Cutters carrying supplies Bering Sea

 

[MikeD]

Some real interesting pieces of history there with regards to the various services. The little-known one being the USCGs combat mission. Everything from convoy escort in WWII, to coastal interdiction of shipping operations in Vietnam, to patrolling the sea lanes of the Persian Gulf; that organization has a very storied history in that realm which doesn't get the limelight that their peacetime missions do.

 

[A Life Aloft]

Yeppers, most people only think of the USCC in regards to rescues at sea and forget missions like the Coast Guard HU-25 Guardian aircraft that mapped over 40,000 square miles in theater and located every drop of oil on the water. This was used to produce a daily updated surface analysis of the location, condition and drift projections of the oil. Saddam Hussein’s Iraqi army was seeking to pollute the Persian Gulf by pouring oil into it. And I believe the USCC had two aircraft used there during this mission.

 

[MikeD]

Was always funny seeing CG Air station San Diego, which is across the street from KSAN. The helicopters and boats were based at the air station, but if an HU-25 or other fixed wing landed and had to go to the air station, they came out of a gate at SAN to an intersection that had it's own traffic light, so they could taxi across the main street there and onto the air station ramp to park.

 

[Hacker15e]

 

[woodreau]

I remember the U.S. Coast Guard doing interdiction patrols and go-plat protection in the Arabian Gulf along side the other ships of the multinational force of TF50 pulling over merchants going into and out of Iraq doing cargo inspections and sharing the misery when the Navy couldn't (probably more like wouldn't) spare a ship to do that mission.

 

[mshunter]

Was always funny seeing CG Air station San Diego, which is across the street from KSAN. The helicopters and boats were based at the air station, but if an HU-25 or other fixed wing landed and had to go to the air station, they came out of a gate at SAN to an intersection that had it's own traffic light, so they could taxi across the main street there and onto the air station ramp to park.

There has got to be a YouTube video of that somewhere.

 

[A Life Aloft]

Sorry that I left off the Merchant Marines, yesterday but I had to go to PT, early dinner and other errands with my family. Even though they are not technically a branch of the Armed Forces under peacetime, they becomes an auxiliary of the U.S. Navy to carry troops and war supplies and are then officially considered a branch of the military and they deserve recognition.

In WWII, US merchant fleet provided the critical logistical support to the war effort. They provided the greatest sealift in history between the production army at home and the fighting forces scattered around the globe in World War II.

During the Korean War, the merchant marine brought some 75 percent of the personnel, as well as mail, food stuffs, ammunition, and a wide assortment of other supplies (around 90 percent of it) to the war zone. The merchant marine was present at the Inchon Invasion and helped save lives during the evacuation of Hungnam during the Chosin Reservoir campaign.

Vietnam

MSTS took about 100 Victory ships out of the National Defense Reserve Fleet (mothball fleet), repaired them, and assigned them to private companies for operation to carry ammunition across the Pacific. MSTS carried guns, tanks, trucks, trains, riverboats, barges, helicopters, bombers, fighters, reconnaissance planes, food, fuel, and medical supplies. By 1965 MSTS had 300 freighters and tankers supplying Vietnam, with an average of 75 ships and over 3,000 merchant mariners in Vietnamese ports at any time.

 

[MikeD]

Vietnam

MSTS took about 100 Victory ships out of the National Defense Reserve Fleet (mothball fleet), repaired them, and assigned them to private companies for operation to carry ammunition across the Pacific. MSTS carried guns, tanks, trucks, trains, riverboats, barges, helicopters, bombers, fighters, reconnaissance planes, food, fuel, and medical supplies. By 1965 MSTS had 300 freighters and tankers supplying Vietnam, with an average of 75 ships and over 3,000 merchant mariners in Vietnamese ports at any time.

If I'm not mistaken, the Merchant Marine also participated in the Mayaguez Incident in 1975, just after the fall of Saigon, when the SS Mayaguez was seized by Khmer Rouge forces and the crew taken captive. Merchant Mariners accompanied the US Marines seizure force that jumped over from a US frigate in one of the first Marines vessel seizures since something like the 1800s. The Merchant Mariners.....engine room people and bridge people, side by side with the Marines...... were required to accompany the Marines in order to quickly get the seized Mayaguez, which was dead in the water, started up and underway to help get it towed out of Cambodian waters.

 

[Autothrust Blue]

Was always funny seeing CG Air station San Diego, which is across the street from KSAN. The helicopters and boats were based at the air station, but if an HU-25 or other fixed wing landed and had to go to the air station, they came out of a gate at SAN to an intersection that had it's own traffic light, so they could taxi across the main street there and onto the air station ramp to park.

Taxiing by that always made me smile.

 

[A Life Aloft]

If I'm not mistaken, the Merchant Marine also participated in the Mayaguez Incident in 1975, just after the fall of Saigon, when the SS Mayaguez was seized by Khmer Rouge forces and the crew taken captive. Merchant Mariners accompanied the US Marines seizure force that jumped over from a US frigate in one of the first Marines vessel seizures since something like the 1800s. The Merchant Mariners.....engine room people and bridge people, side by side with the Marines...... were required to accompany the Marines in order to quickly get the seized Mayaguez, which was dead in the water, started up and underway to help get it towed out of Cambodian waters.

I didn't even know that or at least I sure don't remember it. Great info. I'll have to read up about that. The stuff you remember.....I don't how you do it. My brain has shrunk with age. At least my other parts haven't.............. yet. lol