We Had to Get Out of That Place: A Memoir of Redemption and Betrayal in Vietnam - Paperback

by Steven Grzesik (Author)

Steven Grzesik's counter-culture experience in Greenwich Village ended with a bad acid trip followed by a draft notice. The Vietnam War, then at its height, seemed doomed to failure by cynical politicians and a skeptical public, a prediction he weighed against his sense of duty to himself and to his country.

Through a variety of combat duties--with the infantry, the 36th Engineer Battalion, F Co. 75th Rangers and the 174th Assault Helicopter Co.--and several close calls with death, Grzesik's detailed memoir recounts his two tours in-country, where he hoped merely to survive with a semblance of heroism, yet ultimately redefined himself.

Author Biography

Steven Grzesik served two tours of duty in Vietnam. He spent time in the infantry and the engineers on his first tour. On his second tour he volunteered for the original 75th Rangers, going on many long-range reconnaissance patrols. Afterwards, he flew as a door gunner in the largest air assault of the war: Operation Lam Son 719--the invasion of Laos. A writer for major newspapers and military periodicals, he lives in Seminole, Florida.