Transcripts For CSPAN3 Oral Histories Kenneth Carlson West Point Interview 20180221

Another guy with the same name, kenneth carlson, and he is kenneth r carlson. He was a wrestler. Im kenneth g carlson i was sort of a basketball player. Did that cause any problems to you . Absolutely. The day i reported in the gym, the people that had the roster said you already signed in. I said no i havent. They said you have. I said no i havent. They go oh, my gosh there is two of them. So when we were in the barracks it was much too small. So now ken carlson large. He used to be ken carlson small but he didnt like that so hes now ken carlson handsome and im ken carlson large and it works out fine. He became a fbi agent. As long as you are good with if, im fine with it. Im happy with that. Tell me about your background chblt where you are from and where you grew up. Im an army brat. I was born in detroit. My father deployed to world war ii just after my birth. He went to the pacific as an army officer. He was going to be part of the invasion of japan from philippines. He was an ordinance officer which is why we were in detroit. He came back. No, im sorry, he did not come back. My mother and brother and i went to japan after the war was over and we were part of mcarthur pioneers. We lived in ouk. And he went to school mail order program. And i was two years old at the time. I learned to speak japanese before i learned to speak english because i had an alma who taught me japanese. And he went around speaking japanese. So, anyway, when we came back, i was three years old. And, lets see, where did we go . We went to the naval war college. They didnt send him to the Army War College because they wanted had imto transfer into the air force, brand new air force. My father wanted nothing to do with the air force. So they said, well, you are a rising guy, 06 by that time, so we have to get you some pure el experience so sent him to the naval air college which is pretty cool. We enjoyed that time. All thoi was too young to really remember it. Then we moved around for 16 or 17 more times until he finally ended up in the, well, we ended up in vietnam as a family. Wow. And i have a little article here that im going to give you a copy of. This is from vietnam magazine. And i published an article in this. This is 2009 called my whole family served in vietnam. And so its a twopage article. But its interesting part about it is that a lot of people say my dad served. My brother served. Not many people can say my mom served in vietnam too. Yes, sir. But my dad was deputy chief of the mag under hanging sam williams from world war ii. Got the name hang willing sam because he was in charge of the executions at nuremberg. Wow. He was Lieutenant General and ahead of the 50 or 60 americans in the country. My dad was bringigadier. And there was one other. So we lived in a nice mansion with servants and drivers and all that kind of stuff. But they had to go on the social circuit every night for three or four things a night. And it was really bothering my mother for two reasons. She started to become an alcoholic. But secondly she was standing in high heels on marble stuff for hours on end every day and it was beginning to hurt her back. So in the middle of my second year there what year was this, sir . This was 19 lets think here. 1957, 1958. I got there 1957 and came home in 1958. So i was there for two years. And i had one conference out of with my dad, all these generals are well timed where they are supposed to be, he lingered to talk to somebody at conference and huge planter outside the Office Building where this thing blew up, it was targeted for him. He was supposed to be killed by this planter exploding. So my mother was a little upset about that. And three weeks later the viet minh, they werent congress, they drove by on a motorcycle and threw a hand grenade under the school bus, of course it was moving, and i was sitting in the front, but it blew up the back and a lot of kids cut up. So within a period of a month they tried to kill my dad and tried to kill me. And my mother was then becoming frantic. So just at that point in time, sink pack sent orders to vietnam that said we want general carlson to go to laos and take his family to laos to start the mag in laos which there wasnt anybody there except laosians and i presume some North Vietnamese. And he said no im not going to do that. I cant do that. So me and my mom stayed up all night one night writing a letter why they couldnt do that. My brother was still at west point. Hadnt been with the family two years. Trying to kill us. A lot of Different Things. Anyway they rescinded those orders and he was sent back to the pentagon where he got promoted to second star and retired in 1962. Yes, sir. How was it living in vietnam for you . Except for the hand grenades under the bus . I had a lot of fun in vietnam. I was 13 year old kid chblt i had a diplomatic immunity card. Thats dangerous. That got me hand my friends out of a lot of trouble because i would flash this at the white mice and they had to let us go. We only went to school in the morning. Because it was too hot to stay in the afternoon in quan set hut classrooms. And in the afternoon we went to the saigon, sports club near the president ial palace, block and a half, and it was still populated by french girls because their parents were still working in vietnam even after the french left. So i would go over there and learning french in school but really learned french by talking to the girls in bikini. I had to communicate with these women. So i had a pretty good time. We went to hong kong n die yeah, took some side trips, and finally came home in late 1958. And we went instead of back across the pacific, we went around the world, came back through paris, and i flew across the atlantic on the second one that acrossed the atlantic. First one we got return flight from paris back to new york. Thats exciting. First jet i had ever been on. Now a second ago you said white mice. Some of our listeners why not know what you are calling. Thats the vietnam police. They have cross belt. But when you see them that was the white mice. Yes, sir. So i imagine you learned to speak french pretty well then. I was pretty good french speaker. I took it here and ive used it in current times in europe, advanced french, but if you dont use it you lose it. Did you learn any vietnamese . No. Well, i learned vietnamese swear words. We all knew those. Of course. What year did you arrive at west point . 1962. And what was your expectation when you showed up . Well, first let me say my dad did not want me to come to west point. Hes a 31 graduate. My brother is 61 graduate. And he said ken you are National Merit scholar. You have other opportunities. Have you Ivy League Schools trying to recruit you to come. Why dont you do that. I said i think ill. I think ill go to princeton. Then president kennedy gave favorite speech about let every nation know that we will pay any price to protect liberty, and i said, dad, i changed my mind, i want to go to west point. And i had an appointment already so i had a choice. And he said are you sure . Because its not going to be pleasant. And i said ive heard stories from you and other stories from gunner my brother, so ill be prepared. Well, when i walked in the door, i was too well prepared. Because you pick up and drop your bag the first day, when the man in the red sash tells you to drop your bag, well i set my down, pick it up down, i told you to drop your bag and it bounced because i had filled it to foam rubber to protect all my shaving gear. So the guy looked at it and said your bag just bounced. Open it up. And they saw the phone rubber. And said oh, its one of these guys that knows all the inside stuff. Then they learned my father was a general. At that point i was toast. There wasnt enough first class men to get me to go back. Yes, sir. So it was a challenge. It was a challenge. But i was a good student. I was on the honor roll most of the time. I graduated 57th in my class out of 579 so i sneaked into the top 10 . I was honor but i didnt have any academic problems. One of the things they did with me is my tactical officer called me in one day, never a good idea to have to be called in by the tactical, but he called me in and said i need your help. And i said you need my help . This is when i was a cow. And he said, yeah, i need to give you a new roommate. I said who is that, sir . He said kevin kelly. Well, id be happy to room with kevin. Whats the problem . Hes in the injection seat which means he stands last in the class, and great hockey player. He said im moving him in with you you are the closest star man and i want you to help him with academics. I said i would be happy with that. So kevin would come home from hockey practice. And he would say i need to rest my eyes for just a little bit. So he would lie down on his bed. And id say we are having a written general review in electrical engineering. Are you prepared for that . He would say no not really well. Come over and tell me what i need to know. So i read to him when he was sleeping. And, actually i brought him up 11 files. When he graduated, he was 11th fw from the bottom. When i moved in with him, he was at the bottom. He graduated and fwam a doctor, obgyn. I said if i ever woke up on a pt 0ing table and i saw kevin kelly with a knife standing over me, i would die on the spot. Because he wasnt the sharpest tact in the drawer but he was a good guy and im glad he graduated. Thats a wonderful story. And you said you played basketball a little. I did. I played for bobby knight when he was the coach. And mike sul a man, the all american was one of my roommates. So bobbi was a spec 4 when he was working for the coach at the time. And they asked him kates want today move to South Carolina and they asked bobby knight if he would be the head coach. And he said yeah but im only spec 4 in the army. They said well make you head coach. He said will i make as much aspect 4 . And somebody wrote a number on a piece of paper and said this is what we are going to pay you. And he said okay ill do it. But bobby night is a hands on coach. He would grab you, you know, and we had buckets, not bottles, bukt buckets, but he was a super basketball coach. And now until mike took over, he was the guy who had won the most basketball games in collegiate history. So i only played for him for a year and a half, though, and then i realized i was not going to be a starter. And he and i didnt really get along very well, probably my fault, so i left the Basketball Team and went to other activities. Yes, sir. And so as you progressed through and you get ready to branch, what was in your mind . What were you thinking about for branches . We all had to go, in the class of 66, all had to go to Ranger School. Because they did not send us to the basic course. And they figured maybe if you went to Ranger School you might learn enough about combat that you could actually succeed in vietnam where we all knew we were going. Right. So i said, look, it was wuknwu buckner i decided to go army. But they put us in ha big concrete trench and showed us a tank coming at us, platoon of tanks, all five of them and drive right over the ditch and tell everyone get your ahead down right over the ditch. I said when im commissioned i want to be the guy in the tank not the guy in the ditch thats why i wanted to go armor. And you were high enough you got it . Oh, yeah. Any other classmates that went higher. Yes, wesly clark number one in the class. Usually top guys engineers. Some guys number one man in class wants to go infantry. Wes stood up and said armor. I said oh, my gosh there goes my chance to go to berlin. So at the end of all this i said where are you thinking of going, wes, he said, well im choosing between munich and berlin. You do not want to go to m munich, its all girls. And of course he chose munich. And i was next to pick and i was berlin. How was berlin . Berlin was 90 miles behind the iron curtain. There was the berlin brigade, three in fanty battalion, one tank company, one battery, and one air helicopter detachment. And then of course the britts also had a brigade there and the french. We were occupying west berlin and russians were occupying east berlin. So i went in as a platoon leader of company f 40th armor. And the Company Commander was 34 years old. A guy who had a lot of experience. And he said so when did you graduate from the basic course . And i said, sir, i havent been to the basic course. He said what . I said none of us went to the basic course. They sent us to airborne and Ranger Schools and then out to you. He said what do you know about tanks . I said not very much, sir, but im willing to learn. And he said well unfortunate you cant just learn by experience. So heres what im going to do. It was january of 1967. So im going to send you to nco tank commander course at ville sack in west germany and youll be there with a bunch of sergeants but youll learn everything about a tank. That was the smartest thing he ever did. He was a great kpland der but he sent me down there and i learned how to take them part and put them back together again in the motor pool and the mud. And when i came back the troops were no longer able to make fun of me. Before i left, im sitting out there trying to figure out how to make the tank turn, and one of the sergeants came up, how many times did you do that turning it this way . I said you dont know. You have to keep track of that. Because if you turn it 52 times it unscrews and falls off. So im putting stuff in the logbook that says heres the number of times. And the troops thought this was hilarious. Then im getting in the motor pool, thats where i lived. And i went out and one of the guys took the external phone off of a tank and said sir have you a Long Distance call from america. And i said i do . So i picked it up. And so the guy on the inside of the tank said hi kenny, its mommy. And by this time im going what . Then of course everybody is going oh, my god we got the lieutenant again. You have a lot to learn. But i ended up being a very good experience. One of the more interesting things that happened to me was we had this Immediate Reaction platoon that had to go out in ten minutes notice. Because we had to be checkpoint charley if the russians started making noise and screwing things up again. So one night my platoon was, we all had to live in the barracks when that happened, my platoon was called out 4 00 in the morning to report to the woods that surround berlin. And they said report to sink uz which is the commander in chief of the United States europe, four stars, at block 68. Well, i hadnt been a platoon leader very much, and i was smart enough you lead the column ill be second in line. I know it blindfolded. So we got out there and there was general ill think of his name in a minute but he was there and i reported to him he was standing in hunting clothes next to mercedes. He Said Lieutenant andrew p owe manage a. We called him apo. And he Said Lieutenant carlson, i want you to take your platoon and go down to that wiood line n the other end of this open area and come through the wood line and then when you come out of the wood line, i want you to put your unit in line and come at me with five tanks in line driving right towards this mercedes. And i said yes, sir. He said i want you to be sure to buttoned up. Do not let me see any heads sticking out of any tanks because i want to see if you can do this without hand signals. I had no clue what was coming. So we went down the road, turned into the wood, they said well line up this way. Lets go guys. Everybody lock your hatches. We are going right for the mercedes. And of course what we were doing is driving wild bore. I had no clue. But we drove. He got two wild bore that morning. And my platoon pulled up and got out. He Said Lieutenant that was outstanding. And i got a four star letter of commendation as secretary lieutenant. Do you still have that piece of paper . I have it in my files somewhere, yes. But anyway my Company Commander congratulated me and that was my welcome to berlin. I met my future wife in berlin. She is not a german. Working for the state department. And then i knew i was going to vietnam. I was a platoon leader for a while. Then they picked me to be the bringing ard commander aide which i did did it twor two different, Samuel Baldwin who ended up being in vietnam as division commander, and samuel goodwin, who retired as brigadier out of the berlin brigade. But one age story that i need to tell you, which is one of my favorites. Im four days into being an aide. And general baldwin calls me into office and says we need to go to veil, we have trips training. We need to go there. So set up the arrangements. Sir, when do you want to go . Day and a half from now. So i come out, i have a sergeant who is stenographer and sergeant who is driver who speaks fluent germany. And i said how do you get airplane reservations from pan am to get me from here to frankfort, how do i get to veil . And somebody said, lieutenant, relax, we have your own plane. I said i do . He said, no, not you lieutenant. The general has his own plane. I said well what am i supposed to do . All you are supposed to do is make sure you have a 45 thats loaded, make sure that you have a handcuff that you can carry the generals plans because berlin commander he has to carry the contingency plans where he ever he may be. So hell have top secret documents and youll be armed. How do i get to the airport . I have no clue. They said well pick you up at the mercedes and take you to temple hoff. So there this plane, urks 6. Two pilots in front, two passengers in back. Looks like a chevrolet with wings. So we got in. And general sitting there reading Time Magazine, of course sitting on the right, and im sitting here. I broth my map because i said look im Airborne Ranger im supposed to know where i am 100 of the time. So sitting there looking at the map thinking as we flew over east germany he was going to say what is that, knowing its a soviet installation, he probably knew that. So im expecting him to give me ha quiz. And im realizing na navigating from the air is not the same as ground you cant see the terrain. They all look the same. So all of a you had is eni go in into this panic i have to know. Ill ask the pilots. Okay. So how do i talk to the pilot sns well there has to be a way. They have a general in the back seat. There has to be a way to talk to the pilots. Im looking around. Oh, here, i have a little tube on it, sort of a funnel. Hey, can you guys hear me up there . Hey, can you guys hear me up there. He drops the Time Magazine and says ken why are you talking into the miss tube . I went from 65 to 55 in a mann manner of nano seconds. I said i was trying to talk to the pilots. He said let me show you how to do that reached and tapped and said what can i do for you . But when we got back we were on the seshl circuit in berlin. And he said let me introduce you to the new aide and let me tell you about the first time we flu on the plane. I was a laughing stock of berlin. Thats good. You said you had experience in berlin before. Oh, yeah. Yeah. When i was a cadet on cadet leader training, i went to berlin after we were done, we had a few weeks before we had to go home. So we were sitting, classmate good friend of mine were sitting by the new wall, not the new wall, but the wall had only been up for two years. This is 64. Summer of 64. And so we are having a beer. And looking at little old lady standing in the corp. Er with red light, green light thing, and keeps looking at her watch. Light keeps changing and she never changes the site. And she pulled out a pair of binoculars and looked across the wall. And so we stood up. We didnt have binoculars and looked across the wall. And about five or six blocks in, a little old man leaned out of a sevenstory window with binoculars and waivved to each other and blew a kiss. And i walked over her with my terrible german, what is it that we just saw . Who were you looking at . She said that was my husband. I said how is she your husband is in east berlin and you are in west berlin . The day the wall went up he was on business trip in east berlin. I have not been able to talk to him or touch him for the last two and a half years. Wow. At that point in time i have to tell you the meaning of freedom was never clearer in my mind. I said i want to be stationed here. I want to face these guys on the other side of this wall and give them the italian salute every single day. And i pretty well got there and able to do that. Because my tank platoon moving around all the time and we saw the russians all the time. Wow. That is an incredible story. Thats when i said i want to be in berlin. And thanks to wes clark i got to be in berlin. So when did you return back home from germany . It was in the, let me see, take a look at my cheat sheet here. Okay. I left in october of 68. And got home for a short leave. And then deployed straight to vietnam. And who did you go to vietnam with . Myself. I was an individual replacement. Just after the siege of caisson and the marines it was just after the siege of kayson and the marines needed a lot of help so they brought the first brigade of the fifth mec over from carson to give them more armor support. Because they realized when the marines were surrounded that could have gone either way. When that brigade came over they had a calvary with it. But thats not where i was supposed to do go. I had a set of orders worked with general goodwin worked with patton there are is his son of course, he offered me a calvary troop at the request of general goodwin who said this guys good and you ought to take him. I had a set of orders from da and i got to the 90th replacement battalion and everybodys rushing around go to these classes and so on and im just looking for a jeep. I want to get out of this replacement battalion as soon as possible. And someone comes up and he says where are you going. He i said i have orders for the 11th cr he said let me see those. He looked at me and tore them in half. I said sir, what are you doing . He said we dont give a damn what they say, he said were sending you as far north cause go in vietnam before youre in North Vietnam. Were sending you to dong ha, and thats what i did. Wow. And so what was it like once you arrived at your unit . Well, first let me tell what you happened when we landed at dong ha. I was on a c130 but when i got to dong ha, they never stopped the airplane because the marine airport was under shelling. So the c130 went rolling down the runway and they opened the back and kicked our stuff out, we went out the backdoor, they handed us helmets and we ran for the nearest cover. Welcome to your new unit. 157 artillery coming in on us. Running off a c130. As its still moving. Its still moving and they just pushed the bags out. We left everything there, they hand us helmets, we ran and went back and got our bags later on. Thats an incredible welcome. I had been as far north as da nang when i was a kid, but i didnt know where dong ha was. They said if you fly past dong ha, youre in North Vietnam and youre screwed. Holy cow. I went and got in this replacement again. And they issued us a uniform and get she patches sewn on by the local see vietnamese and they gave us each an m16 rifle. I had never fired an m16 too nor did they give us an opportunity to until the second night. What did you train on as a cadet. M14. Second night. Second night the perimeter was attacked, some major came in and said any of you guys officer . Yeah, we all are. Get your stuff on, heres a clip for your m16. I want you go to this bunker, you go to this bunker. So i ran out there and took charge of a bunker. We werent under a ground attack thankfully. If we had been first time i fired my rifle it jammed and i didnt know what to do. So it was, you know are thankfully it was not a brig ground attack but it was a big attack. And so that was the first day. And then, yeah, two days later i got called in by the Brigade Commander and he said, captain carlson, he said, have you ever been a calvary man . I said no, sir, ive been a tank platoon leader. He said im relieving the 12th calvary and putting you in. And i said, sir, when will that be . I was kind of hoping to be a staff officer get my feet on the ground. Said report down to the landing zone nancy tomorrow. And i did and i was suddenly in command of 318 guys and 44 combat vehicles. Okay. What type of vehicles did you have . M48 tanks and armored calorie assault vehicles which say 11 three with a 50 terret on top of it and two m. 16 machine guns pointing out either side. I had maintenance tracks, medical track with a full set of medics in it, like i said, 44 combat vehicles and that doesnt include any of the wheeled stuff. Okay. What was your mission . Well, interestingly enough, my mission was not do what the brigade told me do, although they did give me missions occasionally. They attached know a tank battalion the first of the 77th armor. But the first of the 77th i was attached to them but they never gave me a mission because the first time i took the troop to the field, which was about four days after i was in command, the first helicopter to land was a marine helicopter. And it was the commander of the third marine division. A fella by the name of ray davis who won the in world war i iwon the navy cross and as a battalion leader in korea won the medal. He was a stud. And i didnt know all that stuff about him at that point in time, but he said ken carlson, i havent met you yet but ive heard a lot about you. So obviously they were doing some research too. And he said now listen, you are youve got a unit that moves faster with more firepower than anything ive got in my division and anything youve got in your brigade. So youre not the words 911 didnt exist in that day. He said youre going to be my fire truck. Whenever i call you for some strange mission, you turn on the red lights and just move like hell. And i said, sir, how will i know what the mission is . He said my operation shop will call you and tell you what needs to be done. But if you ever have a question of what needs to be done, heres my card. He reached in his fatigues and pulled out essentially a business card. On the back of it he wrote his frequency and personal call sign, sudden death 66. He said if you ever have a problem, i only give this to battalion commanders but im giving it to you, so you call me if theres a problem. And eventually i had to do that. A little later on down the line i had do that because i got a stupid order from his headquarters. But, you know, i was Walking Around with a get out of jail free card, essentially, call the 2 star if you need to. So thats your second time in vietnam having a get out of jail free card. Thats right. Diplomatic immunity. And sudden death 66, how to get in touch with him. So howd everything do go . We did a lot of work along the dmz. They wanted us to be a show of force. This was just after the battle of kayson. They were shelled, the battle of kayson lot offed or the siege lasted for five and a half months and these guys, living like animals. And the c130s couldnt get into them because they were being shot at. We or on the low ground and they occupied the hill sides. So every once in a while theyd send my troupe up my troop up there to make sure we could look around. So i took my troop to the boarder several times and came back. Ed on on one come back mission i got a call from the marine headquarters that said stop at kayson, weve got a mission for you. And so i said, what is the mission . They said when the marines left, they left their mines unexploded. So we want to you go out and blow up their mines. I said did they give us a map some no, marines dont make maps. So i said well how do you expect i dont have any engineer capability in my unit. How do you expect me to find these mines . They said we expect to you start driving your combart vehicles around the perimeter of kayson. Its about a mile and a half long and about a mile wide spot drive your drive your combat vehicles around kayson and start exploding the mines. And i said this doesnt sound good, but okay. Ill try. So i blew up two 113s almost immediately, blew their road wheels off and we to fix them. But when a tank went by i said maybe i better lead with tanks here. And we hit an air tank mine and it blew off the idle armor assembly of the tank. Thats the point in time where i said cease work, im calling the division. I called the 06 who was in charge of the operation shop and i said are you the guy that gave me this mission . He said yeah . I said im not doing that anymore, i just medevaced a driver out of one of my tanks. We have no idea what were going to see but im not blowing up my entire calvary troop in order do doh that. He said this is a legal order. I said im not going to do that. That transmission ended on a bad note so i pulled out the card. I said sir he said ken, how you doing . I said not very well. I said i got an order from your up shop here. He said where you are . I said kayson. He said what are you doing . I said im blowing up mines with my vehicles. He said whos the stupid ass hole who told you to do that . I said your o 6. He said your tanks are hitting mines . I says yes, sir. I told him i wasnt going to do that anymore. He said ive got another mission four, collect up your guys, evacuate vehicles you need to evacuate and then continue down ql 9 until you get to these coordinates and turn into the dmz, thats fort worth. Dont gross the ben high river, obviously, which divides north and south vietnam. He said theres a big huge dry rice patty there and i want to you set your troop up in a perimeter which guards that rice patty. I want all the vehicles facing outward. And i said sir, whats the mission . He said set up the perimeter. Thats all i can tell you right now. So we did that. You know, and my lieutenant said sir, what are we doing . I said stand by. I said this is directly from sudden death 66 so were going to do this one. And we sat there for a little while and in comes ch 46, which was the navy version or the marine version of the ch 47 helicopter and the back ramp falls down and out comes six guys in cooks whites carrying cans and they set up along the patty dyke and the hole thing is dry. And then theyre standing there waiting and were waiting and then the lutz call me and say, sir, whats going on . I said stand by. And out of dmz comes a marine force reconteam of about 15 guys. They havent shaved in a month. They are dirtier than dogs and they come walking out and they meet with these guys and they make each one of them an ice cream sundae with soup to nuts. I mean, cherries, whipped cream, cherry on top, nuts. And these guys stand there and eat an ice cream sundae. And they had he hand the stuff back and they put it all in the cans and they walk back into the dmz and the helicopter takes off. And you my lieutenants call me and say sir, what did we just see . I said i think it was an ice cream social. I said i really dont know but all i know is where the order came from. About five minutes later from his helicopter the ch 46 sudden death 66 calls me up and by the way this is the way marines talk on the radio. He said ken, i bet you wonder what we were doing. I said, sir, we were curious. He said those guys had been in the dmz for a month and i thought they deserved an ice cream sundae but in order to make that happen i had to have absolutely security of that dz. I said okay. Because i was one of the guys in the cooks whites. And the only way they would allow me to be that close to the dmz and in that much danger, they made me promise that i would have absolute security and youre the guys who did it. Wow. Semper phi, thats all i could say, semper phi, sir. So i told everybody and they said, thats one of the best missions weve ever had. Getting those guys an ice cream sundae. So several months later, after after i was out of command i commanded for six months which was the standard. I went to the brigade staff and i got a call from the marine headquarters that said general davis would like continue to variety you to dinner tonight not tonight, tomorrow night. The miss america troop is in town and hes going to have them for dinner at his mess. And youre the only army guy were inviting. And they said can you come . I said can i . So i started shining i hadnt shined my boots in months. I started shining my boots and made sure i had a pressed set of jungle fatigues. My driver took me down there and we sat there and had cocktails with the miss america troop and i was the young in the room by was the one with the most combat. I was sitting across the way from the colonel who had given me the original order and we had an interesting conversation but it ended up being, you know, i probably didnt do the right thing, captain and im sorry. But anyway, i sat with ms. New jersey and ms. Arkansas, and 15 minutes well, we were sort of in the mid he will of the dinner and all of a sudden the mps come running in saying were being hit by 122 rockets, we all have to evacuate immediately to the commanding generals bunker. So im looking around at this first plate of dinner ive eat nin half a year and i say, okay. I grab ahold of ms. New jersey and we head out to the bunker. Were watching the rockets coming in and ms. Arkansas is on one side, ms. New jersey is on the other side, and explosions are going off and these women are scared to death. And but ms. Arkansas said, that kinda looks like the fourth of july. And i said no, it doesnt. She said what do you mean . I said people are dying when those things land. That doesnt happen on the fourth of july. And she started crying. Ms. New jersey on the other hand said when you come back from vietnam, where are you going to go . I said well, i dont know. She said i want you to come visit me in new jersey. So i didnt, i didnt, i went back and married the girl that the met in berlin and we had four children and now we have 13 grandchildren. Wow. But i made the right choice. But but, you know, spending the night in a bunker with a couple of good looking ladies on either side of you was an interesting experience. Sure. And what did you do after that . You mean when i left oh, after my command . I went to the brigade s1 shop and answered congressionals. Oh no. My job was well, i had to write all the i had to write all the congressionals for the Brigade Commander to sign so i oftentimes had to visit the site of whatever happened, and i wasnt an ig, but i had been a commander so i knew what questions to ask. And then he would sign the letters and they would go off to ocll, but in one particular case, it was a letter from one of senator kennedys constituents who said, our son, Sergeant Gibbons, was killed in vietnam on the 1st of march, 1969, and he was on a tank. And they told us that they had to seal the coffin because well, they didnt tell us why they had to seal the coffin. We wanted to see his body. So i didnt have to go investigate that one because i was in that battle with Sergeant Gibbons. He was riding on one of my tanks and he was hit by an rpg, and his body was blown apart, and after the after i had gotten control of the situation and we had defeated the enemy that was firing rpgs at us and i had people continuing to work that issue, i went back to see what the wounded situation was, and nobody was touching Sergeant Gibbons, and i said, hey, we got to piece this gentleman up here. We got to start putting his body parts in this poncho and they said, sir, hes not one of ours and i said, yes, he is. Hes an american soldier. So one of the platoon soldiers saw me picking up body parts and putting it in the poncho and he jumped on the other young troopers and he said, youre letting the Troop Commander do that without your help . Youre not thinking, guys. So everybody started helping. Anyway, when this letter came in, i knew what happened to Sergeant Gibbons from personal experience, and we wrote that in the letter. The army made a serious mistake when they said he died of small arms fire. An rpg is not small arms, and his body was dismembered, and so not really fit to be viewed in a casket. But you know, we gave him all the honors we could possibly give him and always awards and decorations. He was a brave soldier. And when i turned that over to the Brigade Commander, whose name was gibson, not gibbons, its the only time i ever saw him cry. So, thats what i did. I wrote 200something congressionals. Wow. In six months and then redeployed back to the United States. And when you came back to the United States, what was your mission . My mission was to get married to the girl i left behind. But i was sent to the infantry advanced course, rather than the armor advanced course, and i, you know, i called armor branch and said, why are you sending me to the infantry advance course and they said, we want armor officers with successful combat experience to go down and tell these guys at the Infantry School where theyre right and where theyre wrong. So i ended up first in the class down there as an armor officer but i had to leave three days early before graduation because i had to report to graduate school at princeton. So they said, youre going to be an honor graduate but youre not going to be a distinguished graduate, and i said, all the tests are over. All the, you know, all the papers are turned in, and i am so many for i had a 99 something average. Arent i the distinguished honor graduate . And they said, we dont really like to give that to other branches. So i was a good graduate, you know, but i wasnt the top guy. And then i went to graduate school. Okay. Tell me a little bit about your wedding. Where did yall get married . All right. My wife lived in salt lake with her family, and my folks were living on the east coast still, and my brother was in oklahoma at the time, i think, at the artillery school. And so, we decided to get married in salt lake, but we couldnt do it at a mormon wedding because both people have to be mormons and they have to be sealed in the temple, but we did get her stake president , which is like your bishop well, higher than the bishop in the mormon church, but he agreed to marry us in a civil ceremony, which we did at fort douglas, utah, in the military chapel there. And it was snowing. It was december 6th. I can always remember that because one day before pearl harbor day is when i got married. It was snowing and we got into the chapel and the night before, my wife to be said, i am just not certain that we can do this. She said, weve had a lot of history together. But youre not a member of the church, and i so i said, well, look, ive flown a bunch of people in here, theyre planning on going to wedding tomorrow so im going to be in my blues standing with my brother who will be my best man. If you dont show up, ill have a little card and ill say, ladies and gentlemen, were not going to have a wedding here tonight, and heres the situation. She said, i dont know. I just dont know. So, wedding came off, and she came in with her father, and they played here comes the bride which is something they dont do at a mormon ceremony. Here comes the bride and she walks up and just about where my father and mother are sitting, she stops. She just stops. And i reach into my pocket to pull out the card, and she says, no, no, no. What happened was her train got caught on a nail, and my father looks down and releases her, and so she comes bouncing forward, and we got married, and she said i do three times so i made sure that she was going to be good to her word. And we have now been married for almost 50 years. Congratulations. Thank you. How was princeton . Princeton was my choice. I was selected to come back to teach in the social Science Department here at west point. And i asked colonel ove, where would you like me to go to graduate school . And he said, you can go anywhere you want, anywhere you can get into. I said, where do you prefer your people to come from . He said, we like harvard, princeton, johns hopkins, stanford. Those are the big schools for International Relationships and also for economics. And youre probably going to teach economics when you first get here. So i said, do you have a preference . And he said, no, thats your call. I said, i think ill go to princeton. And when i got there, the first day we arrived and one of the reasons i picked princeton is i said stanford is the middle of the vietnam war, stanford is in flames, and i dont think i want to go to harvard because its also equally left wing and against the war, but princeton is a pretty conservative place. We went to princeton, the day we arrived, they burned down the rotc building. Welcome to princeton. What year was this . This was 1970. Okay. But we didnt live on campus. I had a great time learning International Relations, except for Richard Faulk, professor Richard Faulk was the guy who took jane fonda to North Vietnam, as antiwar as they get and he was the professor of International Law so we were in one of those great big bowls where the professor speaks and everybody looks down on him and he was lecturing on the vietnam war. Of which i had from which i had recently returned. And he said to everybody there, he said, there are no North Vietnamese troops in south vietnam. These are all indigenous viet kong who are fighting against an illegal government. The North Vietnamese are not involved in this in any way. And i stood up. I didnt say a word. I stood up. Nobody knew that i was a captain in the army. I had started growing my hair a little bit, and i wasnt wearing a uniform. I stood up. And hes giving his lecture and he looks up and he says, who are you . I said, sir, i havent had a chance to personally meet you yet but im captain ken carlson, United States army, and i have just returned from vietnam. And i am here to tell you, sir, that there are lots of North Vietnamese troops in south vietnam. I was engaged with many troops in uniform and we had a very good kill ratio of 100 to 1. I lost 3 guys and they lost 318 guys. So i can assure you, professor faulk, that there are North Vietnamese he said, see me in my office, which i did. And by the way, everybody said, who was that guy . You know . So i went to his office, and he said, i didnt appreciate you interrupting my lecture. I said, sir, i did not interrupt your lecture, i just stood up, and you recognized me and then you asked me what was my problem and i told you. And he said, i didnt appreciate you, you know, trying to invalidate the points that i was making and i said, professor faulk, if you missed the point, you were wrong. And i dont know why you felt like you had to be wrong, but you were wrong. And he said, well, dont do that again. So, i got an a plus in his course, by the way. But princeton was Judith Miller, who is currently on fox news, Judith Miller was one of the classmates i had at princeton, and she was a wildeyed antiwar liberal. She used when she learned that i was an officer, and i put a little sign up on my carol in the library that said, war is my business, business is good. She hated that. She said, how can you shoot those innocent women and children like you did . And i said, well, you just lead them a little bit less because they dont run so fast. I said, judith, we never did that. We never. We made sure we werent killing civilians. Now, thats not to say that no civilians ever died, but none of my soldiers ever shot a civilian. And she said, i dont believe you. I said, well, Richard Faulk is your guy then. But now, shes become a wildeyed conservative. And so somewhere along the line, she saw the light. Now, what was it like teaching . The best three years of my life. I had great people around me. Don was the head of the department. Barry mccaffery was the executive officer. I was working with jack jacobs and wes clark. I was working with a whole bunch of people, a very smart group of poem, and i taught economics the first semester, and i had the only economics training i had was from colonel ove when he was my instructor here as a cadet. And i said, sir, you might recall that what you the grade you gave me was one of the lowest grades i received here in four years. He said, thats right. Thats why im going to have you teach it. Because this time, when you teach it, you really have to learn it before you can teach it. Sometimes i was 20 minutes ahead of the cadets. But nonetheless, i was able to do macro and micro and International Economics and the students loved me. And i loved teaching them. And then the second semester i taught International Relations, about which i knew a lot more, and they said, were going to give you an elective. And the elective was Public Policy and administration. Which is how does the bureaucracy work or not work. And i was pretty much a well read into that too so i had an elective for the last two years. I started with two sections and ended up with six. Wow. People said, you got to go take carlsons course. Fast forward to the time that after i retired. My wife and family are visiting me up in new york. And were walking along, going into the World Trade Center and two guys stopped me and said, are you captain carlson . I said, not anymore. Im mr. Carlson now. He said, but you taught, right . I said, yes, i did. Sir, i had your class. I said, well, that was, you know, 15 years ago. He said, you havent changed much. He said, i threw away everything except my west point atlas of american wars and your course notes, and i still look at your course notes every once in a while when im trying to figure out whats going on in the government, because you had it right. And thats why there were so many people signed up for your course and you had more people than you could handle. Well, my 16yearold is standing next to me. I couldnt have paid these guys enough money to say this. 16yearold saying, my dad doesnt know anything. But you know, they walked away and my son said, wow, dad. Who knew . I said, well, now you do. So i had an interesting experience working on wall street. Lots of interesting experiences, but you dont want to hear those. Well, at the right time, we do, sir. All right. After you left the soc department, where did you go . Thats where guy to my cheat sheet. Thats about the time when you went to the commanding general Staff College . Thats correct. I was a student at the commanding general Staff College immediately after leaving. I went to ft. Levenworth, kansas, i got involved in a whole lot of Community Activities because i had little kids so i had to go referee things and announce things and so on. But i also my wife let me build an office in the basement in our little townhouse that we lived in, and she kept the kids away from me, so i actually did the homework. Most guys said, you know, this is another damn army school, but i figured, look, this is the next level of stuff. So, they also had me teaching courses there. They had me teaching courses on International Relations and economics, which i could do. That wasnt a problem. But i ended up winning the marshall award, and which was a real honor. West clark had won it the year before. But as a result of that, the chief of staff of the army gets to make your next assignment. And so, i didnt know that. They didnt tell me i won the marshall award until the day before the marshall award and i said, well, i need an assignment. And they said, you know, general rogers is the guy whos going to assign you. I said, i need troop time as a major. Will somebody please tell him. I had been promoted to major by that time. Please tell him that i need troop time as a major in order to make me fully branch qualified to become a battalion commander. They said, hell know all that stuff. So he sent me to work on the combat Vehicle Technology program, which was being run out of his office at fort knox, kentucky, and it was not a troop assignment. And i was just, you know, i was going, ive been pardon the expression ive been screwed by the chief of staff of the army so i made arrangements with the 96th armored brigade, which is at fort knox, and i said, i said an xo position as soon as i can get away from this chief of staff issue. Got you. They looked at my record and said, absolutely. Youre the man. And then i came down on the second below the zone to Lieutenant Colonel. And i was promoted almost immediately, so therefore, i never had troop time as a major. Which meant i was not fully qualified to become a battalion commander, at which point in time i went, thanks a lot. You know . Thanks a lot, general rogers. So i never got a battalion. I became a brigade xo in the 8th Infantry Division and i was the ig for 5th corps and i taught at the National War College and i was a member of the founding faculty of the school of advanced military studies, and so i did a lot of educational work, but i never got to the point where people would say, you know, we think that this guy who we promoted twice below the zone to Lieutenant Colonel should be an 06. One of the people at the school of advanced military studies, the colonel who was the head of that, and he said, ive got a congressman coming in who wants to sit on one of the seminars and i want him to sit on your seminar. Send him some literature. So i contacted his office and i said, when is this gentleman going to be able to come and they told me and i said, tell him weve got a 15man seminar and it goes from 8 00 in the morning until noon. Hed like to stay for a week and were going the russian, german Second World War part and it was Newt Gingrich. The congressman from the Atlanta Airport at that time, a brandnew congressman, and he came in and i had sent him a bunch of stuff to read and he came in fully prepared. I told him, congressman, the deal here in this seminar is no quarter asked, no quarter given, so if you say something, that doesnt make it true. Ive got 16 smart majors here who are likely to challenge you. And we went we did that for a week. And he said, these are the best seminars in the military that ive ever been to. He said, you are not trying to run the show. You are letting these guys do the work but every once in while, youll throw in, who thought about this, who thought about that. At the end of the week, my wife victoria and i were having dinner gingrich and he said, i you said youre thinking about getting out of the army. And i said, i got passed over for 06. So thats the bell that says its time to leave the ship. And he said, i want you to come work for me. And i said, doing what . I want you to be my chief of staff. And i said victoria and i looked at each other and said, can we talk about that a little bit . Because this was before he had departed and we came back and said, how much would you get paid as the chief of staff . He said about 70,000. Which was more than i was making but victoria and i said, weve been to d. C. , and we said we dont think we can do that. Weve got little kids, and we dont really think that we can. So ive got other fish to fry, but thank you very much. And so i watched Newt Gingrich grow up, thinking my life would have been totally different had i resigned. And then the second time around, i got picked up. I was one of two combat arms officers, nonselected in the first year, who were selected in the second year. And it was because there were a whole bunch of generals in the army who knew that when i was a brigade xo, i turned in my Brigade Commander for doing illegal stuff, and he got relieved. And i resigned my position as brigade xo and i sent this letter to general vono who was commanding the division and colonel reimer at the time, both later chief of staff of the army. And i went one to the Corps Commander as well and i said, i cant work for this guy anymore and the honorable thing for me to do is resign and heres why. And i laid this out in a sixpage letter of the stuff that he had done, which was illegal, immoral, and fattening. And so, as a result of that, they called me back to fifth corps and said, we want you to run reforger 83, be the head of our plans division, which i did. And then of course he wrote an oer on me before he was officially relieved, which then became a black mark. Once i had sent in my rec lama for this thing, it became a black mark on my record the whole time. So its easy if youre on a promotion board, the object is to get rid of files as fast as you can. If you open it up and see a black mark, thats a discard. But the second time around, all those people who knew that i had gotten passed over the first time wrote letters to the board. So i was the first guy on the list to get promoted to 06. Wow. And at that point in time, they had been glen otis had been trying to get a sams graduate to come over and be one of his plans officers, but carl vono, the chief of staff of the army, said they only go to corps and divisions and otis said, aye ive got the army group. Dont i count . He said, theres not enough to go around. As soon as i came out on the 06 list, otis wrote in and said, i want carlson. So i went to work for glen otis. And then after him, butch saint. I stayed in heidelberg for six years, which was really long but my kids had the opportunity to finish high school, two of them, and then i went back and taught at the National War College and retired, and i finished a 26 years in uniform and 4 years at west point, so when people say how long were you in service, i say 30 years. Yes, sir. Yeah. Did any of your children go to the army . No. Okay. No. That actually they when i was talking to them about, you know, are you interested in going to west point, they said, dad, we know what youve been doing, and thats not the life that we want to live, and i said, you do whatever you want to do. By the time i was in wall street, i said, i can pay for any school you want to go to. So, pick which one will let you in and they all went to byu and all got married out of byu. Wonderful. Now, im going to ask you a little bit about what youve done since the army. Okay. But before that, i see you have a purple heart. Yes. And you mentioned your hearing. Yes. Tell me a little bit about that. The day that Sergeant Gibbons was killed, its called the battle of cam hung. You can google it and you will find a complete description of the battle from a number of different viewpoints, one of which is captain carlsons view of what happened. We were on a night defensive position outside of Quang Tri Combat base, and my ambushes were all out, ready, you know, trying to keep the North Vietnamese from coming in and talking to the villagers at night and extracting taxes and things like that, so we were set up for the night and i get this call from the headquarters of the first of the fifth mech that says, we want you to report to headquarters immediately but not with a combat vehicle, so bring your jeep in. I said, in the middle of the night . Can i come in with lights on . No, blackout. My driver said, where are we going . I said, were going over there, about three miles away. He said, can i turn on the lights . I said no. So we drove in the dark and got there and thankfully, they had told people that a jeep was coming in so they didnt kill us. And i reported to the Brigade Commander. And he said, ken, im about to ask you to do something that ive never asked anybody to do before. I want you to take your cavalry troop and move Cross Country up to dong ha. I want you to cross the dong ha river and get to a place called cam lo and then you will come under the operational control of the third or the fifth cavalry. They found a North Vietnamese regimental headquarters being guarded by two battalions. Theyre on one side of a hillside. They want you on the other side with your cav troop. So we drove all night and because we couldnt have lights on or anything like that, i had to get off the vehicle every so often and shoot an asmt. I think thats the only time that happened in the vietnam war. Cavalry troop moved in the middle of the night without being on any roads whatsoever. We got across the dong ha river, into the place and we had not yet heard from the third or the fifth cav. Nick from the class of 57 was the operations officer. And so i tried to contact him, and we couldnt make contact. So i told my platoon leaders, put everybody to sleep right now. And then you guys come and sit in my track and well figure out what to do. So, we didnt get any sleep that night. But by that time, we had heard from the third or the fifth cav, we want you to move up on this hill and line up so that you were looking down into the valley and were looking down from the other side and weve got those and then theres an Infantry Battalion and marines that have put a cork in the bottle and then were going to blow the hell out of them with the air force and go down and see what happened. So, we sat there and watched the air show the next morning. Outstanding. I mean, napalm, the whole nine yards, and lots of snake and nape. So, then they its 5 00 in the evening, they said, take a platoon of yours and go down the hill and do some body damage bomb Damage Assessment for us. Find out whats left down there. So, i took the nearest platoon and i told them, lead with tanks, and they were missing a tank, so they got another platoon tank. They went down the hill, followed by a cav platoon. I was in the middle of the cav platoon with my track. I wasnt going to lead from a tank. Got down to the bottom of the hill, and suddenly from the woodline, there were still some guys alive with rpgs. And the fire fight ensued. And people were keying their nets, thinking that they were talking on their intercom. They were talking on the troop net, so essentially, i lost command of my troop, because people were, you know, i was getting nothing but talk from other people. I kept saying, get off this net. Finally, i couldnt do it. And i wanted to make sure that everyone was pointing in the right direction because i could see where the fire was coming from. I was a little bit farther back. So i jumped off my vehicle with an m16 filled with tracers. Nothing but tracers. And my platoon leaders and i had this deal where i said, if i cant communicate with you and you see people firing nothing but tracers, thats me. Shoot that way. Okay . So, i jumped off, and when i was running over to get to a position where i could start shooting tracers, my rifle got knocked out of my hand. I said, what the heck was that . I dont remember dropping my rifle. So i picked it up, kept on with the mission, and started firing tracers and everybody picked up the message and all started shooting in the right place and the fire fight was over in perhaps five minutes. We killed everybody inside that woodline. And so then, on the way back, im walking up the hill, and first of all, i helped pick up Sergeant Gibbons, you know, i told you that story already. Right. Im walking up the hill and theres another one of my troopers who was a maintenance guy who had gotten hit in the arm by an rpg and had a huge hole in his left arm. Name was fryler. And he was up on the hill where we were having medivacs, but all the medics were down there working on the troops so i stopped to see what i could do for him and he said, captain carlson, i cant stand the pain, you got to give me some morphine. Im not allowed to carry morphine. He said, you got to do something. So i hit him as hard as i could. Bam, right in the side of the jaw and i knocked him out. I also broke these two knuckles, which are still broken. They look a little different. But so he was out. And then they in fact, i carried him to the helicopter and put him on the medivac, and at that point in time, i suddenly realized that there was something going on with my left arm. It didnt feel right. And so i looked down, rolled up my sleeves, and i had been shot. What had knocked my rifle out was my rifle was hit by an ak47 round, and that ricochetted into my arm and boom, i dropped the rifle. But i didnt know that. I was pumping so much adrenaline that when i finally got to the point, i said, hey, any medic around here . Oh my god, the captains been hit. They pulled the bullet out and dressed the wound and they said, we have to send you back to the hospital because you may have broken a bone but its not a life threatening wound. I said, put me on some damn helicopter, i want to be back here soon at night. This night. And they did. They looked at me and they said, no broken bones, they put a better surgical wrap on it. I was back in command. The next day, the mission was to take people down and go through, again, this time not being ambushed in the middle of the just before its dark, go down and do some dismounted patrols. So i put out three patrols, all infantry guys. I was the only ranger in the company. The cavalry troop. So i said, i think im supposed to be at least in one of these patrols, just to make sure that the things dont go bad. Just before you know, and ive got im making guys jump up and down, make sure they dont make any noise and everybody has their faces blackened and were doing ranger stuff. Yeah. And so, at that point in time, a helicopter comes in and two guys from cbs news jump out wearing hawaiian shirts, and one of them has this big camera on his shoulder. And i said, what do you want . And he said, we want to go with you on a patrol. I said, i dont think so. And the Public Affairs officer from the division said, yeah, you got to let them do that, capital. Guys from cbs news, Walter Cronkite, remember him . And i said, you got to let them come with you. But just make sure that theyre protected. I said, all right. Heres what i want you to do. Reporter, you be here, cameraman, you be farther back. I dont want to hear a word from you. Take the pictures you need to take and if you need to talk to me, come up and whisper to me, but were going down there, and i dont know what were going to find. There may be fire coming back. So, we go down and were were actually walking in a stream bed, because, you know, you dont walk on trails, and there were trails in there because thats where the North Vietnamese had been. And were following wire, chinese wire, and i have with me a North Vietnamese defector called a pit carson scout. Right. And hes a former major, and we come to a bend in the stream bed and he said, careful. Could be ambush around the side. So i said, okay. He said, maybe you put men up on the hill. So i pointed to one of the machine gunners and his assistant, and i said, you guys climb out, go up there and tell me when youre ready because were going to go around and hill and if we start taking fire, i want you to blow away anything that does that. These guys got out of the stream bed and started climbing up the hill and the cameraman in the hawaiian shirt says, hold on. I didnt get that. As loud as he could. And i turned around, and i said, get that guy up here. And he came up. I said, what did you just do . He said, i had to get the shot. These guys were climbing i said, did i tell you to keep quiet or not . He said, yes, but ive got a job to do too. I said, if you to that one more time, i personally will shoot you, and it wont be pleasant. It will be pleasant for me, but it wont be pleasant for you. So he was very quiet at that point in time. At the end of this patrol, we had found mountains of North Vietnamese equipment, lots of blood trails, lots of ammunition, lots of weapons, and my guys are Walking Around smiling and picking up aks and, you know, skss and North Vietnamese pistols, and so were doing, you know, the kind of a battlefield check, and the guy from cbs news is talking to his camera and he said, these soldiers are tired, and theyre hungry, and theyve been out here for months on end, and they dont know why theyre here. They dont know and i said, cut the camera off. I said, what are you talking about . Look around. These guys are delighted at what we just did. And all we took was, you know, a couple of casualties up on the hill, but look at what we did to the North Vietnamese army. He said, captain, you dont understand. If i want this to show up on cbs news, Walter Cronkite does not want the American Army to look good so i have to say this stuff im saying at the end even though i may or may not believe it and my dad, he was still on active duty, and he saw no, he wasnt active duty anymore, but he saw that on cbs news and got in touch with me by going into the pentagon and reaching me by radio and said, this is big swede 6, do you know who i am. I said, yeah. Yes, i do. He said, what the hells going on with your unit . It looks like theyre about to mutiny. I said, dad, that was cbs news. Here was the battle count. 300 of those guys got killed. I lost one soldier killed and five soldiers wounded and i was slightly wounded. He said you okay . I said, im fine. But dont believe anything that you see on cbs news. So thats that goes back to what you were talking about with your professor when you were oh yeah. All these guys all the dead guys were in North Vietnamese uniforms. All these were North Vietnamese ammo and equipment, some tricom stuff too. There wasnt any question about who it was and what uniforms they were wearing. Wow. Okay. So, thats the story about how you got wounded. Yeah. That time. All right. That was how i got wounded the first time. Oh. How about the second time . Second time was next day. Oh my goodness. Next day, we were told to pull out and go join up with the 35 cavalry for a new mission. And so i got all my guys together, but we had vehicles that were and i, like i said, the major was the guy in charge no, he was the operations officer, but then lonesome end, carpenter from west point was the commander of the third of the fifth cavalry at that time as i recall. I dont remember his first name. Carpenter. But he was a lonesome end. So i figured these are two guys who really know what theyre doing. And on the way out of our battle position, i did not lead with my track because, although i believe the commander should lead from the front, they should not be the very first vehicle. Targets too so, i rode on the back of a tank. I was sitting in the bustle rank. I had an extra radio with me so i could communicate with the Battalion Headquarters and i was the one, two, three i was the third vehicle, you know, in line. We had three tanks. I was on the third vehicle. The North Vietnamese command detonated a mine underneath my tank because they saw there was an extra radio, extra guy riding on top, and so all i remember the bomb i was told later was a 250pound air force bomb that had not exploded and they turned it into an ied and command detonated it and they were looking for the right vehicle and so they blew my tank to shreds. Heres what i was told afterwards. I flew up in the air about 30 feet and landed on my back and there was blood coming out of every orifice of my body, places where i never knew blood could come out of. And i was unconscious. And nick was flying in a helicopter above the battle, watching all of this, and he saw that i was down. He didnt know who i was at the time, but nick never knew me, but i knew him. He landed his helicopter and they loaded me in within three minutes of actually being blown up and they took me to bravo med, third marine division, and i woke up on an xray table with a roundeyed nurse cleaning me up from places i didnt think she was supposed to be cleaning me up from. And the doctor came over and he said to me, and all i could hear was and he said, oh, he cant hear anything. So he wrote a note and he said, your back is not broken. But youll pay for this in future years. Future years are here. And so now i cant walk more than about a mile before i because i now have scoliosis, a crooked spine. I said, where did i get that from . I said, you cant get into west point with scoliosis. Its a disqualifying effect. And they said, you know, disqualifying, whatever it is. And they said, you probably got it when you got blown up. And of course my ears are pretty clear where this came from and so at any rate, i continued on and finished a 30year career with hearing aids and with a bad back, and im now being nicely compensated by the veterans administration, but i was wounded twice in two days. By the way, i did not get a second purple heart, because no medic ever treated me in my unit. Nick came down, they put me on board, they took me to bravo med, and the marine corps destroyed all their medical records five years ago, all their vietnam medical records, gone. So they have no proof that i was wounded in their facility because they didnt admit me. They said, put this guy in a jeep and take him back to his lz nancy. Hes going to have to be on bedrest for at least three weeks and he cant hear anything. So i was out of command and taken down to nancy, laying in bed. When my troop came back in, i said, put me in my jeep and take me to the gate and i stood up as best i could and saluted them as they came in. Wow. Thats a good i bet they were glad to see you. They were glad to see that i was Still Standing up. I was glad to see them too. But i couldnt hear anything for a very long period of time until i finally got hearing aids. Sure. What happened to the rest of the crew on that tank . The platoon sergeant was wounded. He stayed inside the vehicle and so he received shrapnel wounds. The driver was medivacd, badly wounded, and he was medivacd. I dont think anything happened to the gunner or the loader. Other than that, my rule was, you dont lead from the rear. They got to see, if were going through mine fields, they got to see me up in front somewhere, not in the first vehicle, but they got to see me up front somewhere because i got to take the risk to show them that its worth taking. Right. Wow. So, what did you do after the army . After you retired, you retired as a colonel. Yeah. I got a call one day. I was professor of strategy at the National War College. So, youre teaching not just army guys, army, navy, air force, marine, coast guard, fbi, treasury department, all these and civilians who also go to the National War College. And so i was one of their professors of strategy. Im one of the guys who took them to gettysburg and talked about the leadership lessons of gettysburg. The air force guys said, what would have happened if lee had a b52 . I said, yeah, thanks, colonel. Thanks for your comment. But i really enjoyed that job. But then i got a call one day from jack jacobs, gold friend from the social department, medal of honor winner. I said, howd you get ahold of me . He said, i used to work there too. I said, where are you now . He said, im in london. I said, what do you do . He said i make a lot of money and have a lot of fun. I said, okay, what can i do to help you . He said, ive got these 14yearolds who run this bank who know nothing about leadership and ive told them they need to read infantry attacks by rommel but i cant find it here except in a rare book room in london and they want 250 pounds for it. Could you check around the war college and see if somebody had a copy of rommels infantry attacks and would be willing to sell it to me for something less than 600 or whatever that was in pounds at the time. I said, sure, happy to. I look around and theres three people who i found in the war college who had a copy, none of whom were willing to part with it because they knew how rare it was. So i went to the pentagon, little old lady in the pentagon that i knew for many years, and who ran the bookstore, and she said, rommels infantry attacks was published in 1952. She said that from the top of her head. I said, yes, it is. Do you have a copy of that . She said, i dont think so but lets go look in the storeroom. So she took me she took a flashlight and a duster and she took me up to the storeroom, which was on the top floor of the pentagon and it was one of those Indiana Jones storerooms, all this stuff is in there. She said, you wait here and ill go see. And about 15 minutes later, she came back with a hard copy of rommels infantry attacks, 1952. And i said, how much am i going to have to pay for this . She is, i have no idea. Theres no bar code on it. She checked her computer and said 4. 50. So, i put it in an 18 fedex envelope and i sent it to jack, and he said, you know, he called me up a couple days later and he said, i dont know how you did that, man, but theyve asked me who is this guy and how can we get him to come and work for us . And i said, work for who . Bankers trust. I said, jack, im still in the army. He said, retire. Its time to retire. And i said, well, i dont have a resume. And he said, get a resume by tomorrow. And send it over here. They want to hire you. They just want to see the resume. So they called me up and said, you know, wed like to extend this offer to you. And so i said, okay. Ill do that. And took off my uniform, retired at fort meyer in a ceremony. My kids and my wife were able to attend, and i went back and my brother called up. He had retired earlier, and he said, when you took off your uniform for the last time and you were hanging it up, did you did you think about what all of that meant to you and what all of the ribbons stood for and all of the stuff that you have hanging on your uniform, and i said gunner, i really didnt have time to think about anything, i was packing to go to new york the next day. I had to be in new york the next day. The bank gave me an apartment in new york. I stayed there for four months learning the ropes. I had to learn how to be a brokerdealer and i did all that and then my boss says pack your stuff, were going to london tomorrow. I said how long are we going to stay . It doesnt matter. We only take hangup bags. So i packed as much stuff as i could pack into a hangup bag and i went to london, and i didnt come back for a year. Wow but in london, he said i said, what am i supposed to do here . I didnt bring enough shirts and he said, arent we paying you enough . Go to the row and get yourself some decent clothing, buy expensive ties and start looking like a banker because the first rule of banking if you want peoples money is you have to look like you dont need it. I spent a lot of money doing it and they were paying me a lot of money and a lot of bonuses, as well so one night in london he said hey, ken, were going to have dinner with Thompson Electronics tonight. The cfo and the ceo and weve got a lot of money theyve got a lot of money with us so were doing it tonight and i want you to meet me in heathrow in about three hours and he said where are we doing this . In paris, of course, and got picked up by a limousine and went down to a fourstar michelin restaurant. I think theres, like, two of them in the road and on the left bank, and i came in and sat down with these guys and they brought the wipe list ane list, and i k wine list because id been in germany. I want to start with champagne and i want one to go with a fish dish and a red and a white to go with the main course and then something before the end and some sort of cognac or whatever and some cigars. So i had learned enough about wine lists and i asked how do i do this . It was a 47page wine list. Go about threequarters up the price list and start looking for stuff that you recognize, and i did. Oops excuse me, and so i started recognizing stuff, and so i ordered these wines and the french guys who spoke fluent english, youve got yourself a winner and i said thank you very much, very good choices for the wines and after a few minutes one of them said next to us in this table right here, isnt that dr. Henry kissinger, and i looked over and said yeah, it s is, would you like to meet him . You know him . We would be so honored to meet dr. Kissinger. Colonel ken karlsson, United States army, you may remember me from when you came to the school of advanced military studies and you talked to us about military studies and he said what are you doing now . Im a banker. Congratulations and im here with Thompson Electronics and they would like to meet you. Can they come over and shake your hand . He said absolutely not. I said im sorry. I didnt mean to interrupt, and Henry Kissinger comes up and sits down and chats these guys up for the better part of five to ten minutes, signs their menus and tells them how lucky they are to be able to deal with a guy with the integrity of a former military officer. Wow im sitting there going and my boss is just drooling. So at the end of this thing, the bill came for the four of us 1500, and you know, i said i didnt say anything. I didnt have a visa. I didnt have an American Express card so i signed a visa card that i was sharing with my wife and i had to call her Long Distance and say i just put 1500 on the visa card. You may be concerned. But on the way out, am i going to get in trouble for this . The four of us 1500. Youre not in kansas anymore, ken. Youre in the banking world now. We spend money like this all the time. Youre not going have any trouble with this on your expense account, but there was one thing you missed when you were trying to sign your name and your hand was shaking. They gave us an envelope. They gave us another 100 million to manage for them. Your 1500 are going to be lost in the rounding errors, but you are going to get a big bonus for what you did tonight for introducing them to Henry Kissinger and ordering from the wine list and i said im not in kansas anymore. Wow so i had some great experiences with Bankers Trust and eventually they dissolved my entire division when they were trying to become Deutsche Bank and they got rid of their International Investment because Deutsche Bank already had that and they didnt duplicate that in new york, and so i went to work for a Company Called Sei Investments which was a Mutual Fund Company in pennsylvania and my i had a territory coast to coast allmedical establishments which had major investment pools. My job was to go sell them the idea of working alongside of sei which would invest their money for them and their 401 k funds and other retirement. I did that for a few years, three or four years and then i was in this big car accident. I got hit by a truck from behind, an 18wheeler drove me into the car in front of me. I had a rental buick that became a volkswagen and when the guy came up from the truck and i said are you okay, and i couldnt feel anything on the left side of my body and i said i dont think so. It turned out there was a fire station right across the street and they came out with their ambulance, took me to the hospital and i stayed in the hospital for about a week, and then went back to business, but i could no longer lift my bag above my head to put it in the overhead bin, and i was taking lots and lots of drugs for all of the pain that i had so finally they had to let me go because i couldnt do the job any longer and i said fine because i had two disability policies with them i was and receiving Workers Compensation and the guy in the truck had big insurance and then usaa, i had uninsured or underinsured coverage, so i ended up with a lot of money out of that accident, and then i was fully retired at that point in time. But you probably didnt need that on your back. No, yeah. And thats what further complicated me having a back injury. You know what . Then i became a cancer patient, and and you survived that. And i survived that and it is now 2015, and i am still talking. Thank god for that. And im talking to you people. That is that is an incredible story. Did anything any of the things you learned at west point or the army help you in your business . Absolutely. Absolutely. Okay. First of all, you better be honest. There are a lot of people in business that are less than honest. You need to tell the people the down side as well as the upside. If you only tell them the upside and things go wrong theyll never do business with you again. And so i made sure that all of the people who were my clients understood dont react to every single move of the market. Thats a stupid way of investing, but if weve got you out of balance, were going to get you back in balance by increasing over here and decreasing over here, but were looking out were trying to look out for your investments and not from our perspective, but we can make money for overtrading you and we dont want to the do that, but i had the trust of everybody who and i had lots and lots of money under our management, but nobody ever said, you know, were not comfortable because i was the guy that they were talking to. Okay. So the integrity absolutely. Is part of the military. Absolutely. And of course, the ability to take charge when you need to, and the ability to see the difference between right and wrong and the ability to plan ahead and all things that you learn when youre a cadet and you actually practice when youre a military officer. Theyre all extremely important in business. Sir, this has been a fabulous interview. Is there anything that i havent asked you that youd like to say . Go ahead. What does west point mean to you . I, right now, lead a group of 26 of my classmates. We come up here and we have come up here 14 times now to help teach the professional military ethic to cadets now called the cadet military character program. Right. Weve been doing that since the class of 2016. We were plebes, we were the last to talk to them as plebes. The opportunity to come back to west point and give back for all that west point has given to us is an amazing one. Every time i do this i take pictures of the class and i publish them in the class newsletter and more people say that looks like a mini reunion, and so now ive got a much larger group than either 67 or 68 or 63 had and so weve got almost 30 people that come up here at their own expense because it is so important to pass on the values that were given to us that we have tried to live for 30 or 40 years. For us now its almost 50. Right. So i i am i just cant tell you how much west point means to me both having been here, having been on the faculty here and having an opportunity to talk to cadets and even now at our 50th, as we approach our 50th year, people say people sometimes ask me, where is west point, and i say, its 55 miles north of new york city and 75 years ago. Whats that mean . Theres tradition there that continues to move forward, but it is unlike any other place youve ever been. There are people out there who care about each other. They care about what theyre doing. They know that they are going to be leaders of character and theyre trying to develop their character, and this is the place to do it. Its the finest Leadership School in the military. Maybe Ranger School is a close second. Ranger school will put you through the wringer to show you what you can do. Ranger school, by the way, also, because i never commanded a cavalry troupe, when i first showed up with my cavalry troop and the first question is does this captain know anything . I had a set of airborne wings and an airborne patch and they said this guy knows what hes doing. So doing all of those things starts by coming to west point, and i was thinking when they were making fun of ben carson for saying ive got a full scholarship. I had a class dinner the other night up in cornwall and we had 35 people at the class dinner, and i stood up at the beginning and said my name is ken carson and 50 years ago i had a full scholarship to west point. It cracked them up and they got it and theyre up on the news and good enough to know what that means, but it really is one of the seminal moments of my life is to come to walk through here. People say whats the best view you ever saw in the west point . In the Rearview Mirror because i was anxious to get out, but once i knew all of the things that i knew i wanted to go out and do it and so thats why i wanted to go into the army and thats why i wanted to go to berlin and i was happy to be in vietnam and i would have extended in vietnam had i not been wounded. You know i couldnt im a blessed man. Yes, sir. Blessed man and surviving all of the stuff that ive survived since then. So anyway, thats my story and im sticking to it. Thats a wonderful story. Thank you so much. All right. Sunday on cspans q a. Duke Divinity School assistant professor kate bueller talks about her memoir, everything happens for a reason, reflecting on being diagnosed with stage four colon cancer at the age of 35. I felt the presence of god. I felt the love of other people, just people pouring in, the intense all of the intense prayers. I mean, the second i got sick my whole Little Community got together in a chapel and just prayed like marathon runners for me, like handing off throughout my whole surgery. Part of it was them reflecting back to me love and also was just the sense of, like, my hope is that as youre preparing to die i was having to make preparations that someone or something meets you there, and i certainly felt that way. Q a, sunday night at 8 00 eastern on cspan. The cspan bus is traveling across the country in our 50 capitals tour. We recently stopped in little rock, arkansas, asking folks whats the most important issue in their state. The issue thats kind of important in arkansas right now is there is a huge hispanic population within our high schools in the area especially northeast arkansas, and so what we see especially here is that a lot of the hispanics arent coming. We have this thing called the live program and we want all High School Students to know that they can come. So for me its really important that not only hispanics, but everyone has that opportunity to know and regardless of whether i have daca or undocumentation or whatever circumstances you may be like you can come to college. So thats kind of important right now for arkansas. The issue thats important for me in arkansas is animal welfare. Im in Animal Rescue with ark and paw Animal Rescue and we deal with a lot of abuse and neglect, and we dont have Law Enforcement backing and we have laws in arkansas and theyre not very strict so its a big issue because we deal with the animals and we see what they go through any we dont have any place for these animals to go. We dont have the funding for them and people are not held accountable for the abuse they inflict on animals, so thats a big issue for me is just stricter laws and more enforcement of those laws and backing shelters to hold people accountable for what they do. I really dont want anybody in government doing much of anything. I believe in the states being experimental units for the government and try Different Things and create Different Things and see how they work because most ones if they dont work out very well it is very hard on the whole country, and i believe thats what the founders wanted us to do is to use the states. One of the most important issues, i think, for citizens of little rock and the state of arkansas, and an area that we would dearly love for our representatives in d. C. To take a look at and thats the Affordable Care act. This is also the winter months and they talk about the intensity of the flu season so health care is important for each and every individual while education is important, working is important, but without Good Health Care you cant perform those to the best of your ability. So i think thats a major issue for little rock citizens, arcansans and all of america. Agriculture is one of the number one industries in our state and weve got an upcoming farm bill where theyre passing legislation, you know, they can really look at that to protect our farmers rights and we have things that affect the poultry industry and the gipsa bill and they cannot attach riders to that and allow those, and they can protect our farmers and thats the most important thing is protecting our constituents at home. Voices from the states on cspan. Remembering vietnam is a ti