BROOKINGS – For Leo Stirling, 69, of Brookings, a military career that would span four decades began in 1965, a month after his 17th birthday.
He was attending Parkston High School and enlisted in the South Dakota Army National Guard. He would spend 1 1/2 years before graduating from high school, going on active duty and serving a year in-country Vietnam as an engineman, diesel mechanic, in the United States Navy. He would later return to the Guard and serve until 2008, retiring as command sergeant major of the 88th Troop Command, headquartered in Brookings.
The Navy wasn’t Stirling’s first choice for active duty following high school graduation.
“I decided I wanted to go active for a couple years,” he explained. “The Army wouldn’t let me in for less than three; the Navy took me for two because they considered me ‘prior service,’ having my basic training and advanced individual training done.”
However, the switch from the National Guard to the Navy and prior to his deployment to Vietnam required some additional Navy-specific training. In February 1967, he went to San Diego for eight weeks of basic training; he followed that with two months of engineman/ diesel mechanic school at Great Lakes, Illinois; finally came a month of survival school at Little Creek, Virginia.
Knew the Army supply system
In November 1967 Stirling flew out of Seattle-Tacoma International Airport to Cam Ranh Air Base, South Vietnam.
“There were about 500,000 (American troops) when I was there,” he said of the American military presence in South Vietnam during his year tour there. “It was the big buildup. I was there during Tet of ’68.”
His duties didn’t take him far from where he landed in-country. He was assigned to the Naval Communications Station, Cam Ranh Bay. As an engineman third class, he worked on vehicles, ran generators and pulled security duty.
“We had some mortars and satchel charges on our docks,” Stirling said. “But I was down in the peninsula and really hard to get to. We didn’t get much action; I did mainly support work.
“I was out at the tip of the Cam Ranh Bay peninsula. They had a Swift boat base and a big communications station for Vietnam. For about six months we repaired vehicles and then I ran generators for about three months, and then for about three months we pulled security and whatever else needed to be done.”
In a touch of irony, Stirling’s National Guard background helped him with some of his Navy duties, particularly in support of the Swift boats, albeit as a sort of secondary assignment.
“I didn’t have much to do with the Swift boats,” he admitted. “I helped out with the Swift boats once in awhile; I knew the Army (supply) system; so they had me go over and pick up the parts from the Army side.
“For our vehicles we had to go through the Army to get our parts. They kind of had a roadblock with the guy that they had over there. So I would go over and order the parts and get them.
“I knew the Army system. I had been in the Guard for two years in the maintenance section.”
Following his tour in Vietnam, Stirling flew back to the United States to finish his remaining six months in the Navy. He was assigned to the USS Horne DLG-30, a guided missile destroyer home-ported in San Diego.
Don’t mess with a sailor’s pay
Asked if he had thought about staying in the Navy, Stirling said, “I really did. When I went in, I was going to stay in; but then I had a couple bad experiences.
“When I came back from Vietnam, I flew through Seattle and was coming home and some old chief (petty officer) jumped on me because my tie wasn’t right.
“I told him I hadn’t had a uniform on in a year; I wore jungle fatigues. He gave me hell and said that’s no excuse.”
Stirling’s second experience involved something no soldier, sailor, Marine or airman ever wants to see: a problem with their pay.
“When I was in Vietnam, I put my whole paycheck in that 10 percent savings program,” he explained. “And they kept saying when you leave, you’ve got to cancel that. So I canceled that.
“I come back from 30 days leave and went aboard my ship. And they wouldn’t pay me. They said something was wrong. I went and checked.
“One of the pay clerks hadn’t initialed one of the forms. So they wouldn’t pay me until I’d worked off that extra money I’d gotten. I had to write home and get money to live on for two or three weeks.”
At this point, Stirling decided to go to college, “and it just worked out.”
Student, Guardsman, veteran
Following his discharge from the Navy in 1969, Stirling enrolled at Southern State College (Springfield) to study diesel mechanics and vocational education. Since he was busy with school and working, he didn’t go back into the Guard.
After a year-and-a-half, just as he was set to begin his student teaching requirement, a full-time position as a federal technician came open and he went to work for the Guard while at the same time going back to the part-time Guard as a specialist. He would also go on to earn an associate degree.
He stayed with the Guard for a total of 38 years, retiring as command sergeant major of the 88th Troop Command, headquartered in Brookings. He accepts his successful career with a modicum of modesty and a sense of humor.
“I liked to go to schools,” Stirling said with a smile. “I enjoyed the training and working at that. I outlasted the rest of them, I guess.”
Meanwhile over the years, he has supported his fellow veterans as a member of the Veterans of Foreign Wars, American Legion, Disabled American Veterans and Rolling Thunder.
A hearing loss qualifies Stirling for membership in the DAV.
“I lost hearing, between working on the rifle range and diesel engines,” he explained. “I got a disability (rating) for my hearing.”
Stirling sees the Veterans Administration today taking a lot better care of veterans today than in the past.
“When I got out of Vietnam, they told me I could go to the dentist once,” he said. “That’s all I even knew that I could do. I applied for the VA, but I was making too much back then. I never used the VA because I had insurance through work.”
He does use the VA for his hearing loss and also for glasses. Stirling speaks well of the VA and sees people satisfied with the care they receive.
He drives the DAV van that transports veterans to the Sioux Falls VA facility for treatment: “The people I haul down there, they see Sioux Falls as a really good system. They do a good job treating people.”
Overall, the VA system in Sioux Falls “does a good job of caring for veterans.”
Leo Stirling is married to the former Marilyn Bombeck. They have a married daughter and two grandchildren in Sioux Falls.
Contact John Kubal at jkubal@brookingsregister.com.
