Something Different: A Tardy Salute

A year-long book project has kept me mostly off Medium, but I learned why our vets deserve a tardy salute.

A few of you Medium readers may have noticed that I’ve been more or less missing in action the last year. Over the five years I’ve been writing on Medium, I’ve averaged a bit over a post a week, but not for a while. That’s because a book project has consumed most of my writing time.

When Medium writers publish books, like Tim Andersen, Ethan Siegel, or Benjamin Cain, their books are usually related to the topics they write about on Medium. Not me. My topics on Medium are mostly about science, faith, philosophy, and theology. But the book I wrote is about a Vietnam helicopter pilot. Not just any helicopter pilot, but one of the most decorated American pilots of any conflict. Chief Warrant Officer Terry Crump was awarded seven Distinguished Flying Crosses in his one-year tour in the conflict. That may be unprecedented. The book is called It Was My Turn: One of Vietnam’s Most Decorated Pilots and America’s Secret War.

Before you say ho-hum and move on, let me tell you why I think this is important. Previously I’ve written two World War II biographies — one about a German soldier on the Russian front and the other about an American…