I was a 20450, Air Intelligence Specialist and that covered a lot of territory. At Beale in Marysville CA, 66-67, I was in a vault for 6 months updating maps of a very large country that speaks Chinese. I also pulled alert with Buff Crews with the reward being the best damned chow in the Air Force. Gormet Chefs...master sgts, all trained in Cullinary Institute of America (CIA). God, what good food.
At Ubon in 67-68, I was a target specialist for all the aircrews from every squadron. Made and updated maps for the mission folders, picked out best photos of the targets for the mission, whether it was the Paul Dumer bridge downtown, the Thai Nugyen Iron and Steel works or a RR bridge. Was lucky enough to brief and debrief the legendary Robin Olds on two occassions.
Back in the states, I was at Shaw AFB, SC, again in the target's section...but this time our target was a small island off the coast of Florida..so I Iearned where Jose Marti Air Base was and got to look at many of the old Missle sites the Soviets put there...interesting stuff.
When I went to Udorn in '69, I was with 7/13th DI whose mission was unlike any on the base. The 432nd's misson was recce and bombing in Laos, So. Vietnam etc, since Rolling Thunder was kaput. Our mission was to support the "secret war" in Laos. I quickly became familiar with Lima Sites, Long Tieng, Sam Tong, etc and a little General named Vang Pao. I got to meet some of the Raven characters such as Fred Platt, (Magnet Ass) brave bastards all. I spent time up in the mountains in Laos at Vang Pao's base, Long Tieng....met Vang Pao, helped him with some maps one day, loaded bombs on a couple of T-28s one day when the bomb loaders were overwhelmed. As R&R, I spent time in Vientiane at world famous spots like The White Rose, Purple Porpoise and Madam Lulus...I was sure I saw Steve Canyon and Terry and the Pirates walking the shadowy streets of that city. Took the narrow guage train from Udorn to Bangkok a couple of times to see the country, went to Pattaya Beach when it was pretty empty....and otherwise enjoyed my four years, 6 months of active duty. Couldn't have planned it any better.
Larry Clum