Posted on 08/18/2008 2:51:29 PM PDT by Interesting Times
John Smith said he was a Navy SEAL who was imprisoned in Vietnam after his helicopter was shot down.
Troy Brodrick spoke in schools about his 30-year military career in which he earned three Purple Hearts and flew President Eisenhower as an Air Force One pilot.
William Whitely, a former University of Oklahoma professor, told stories of his career as a Navy SEAL while he served as a mentor to Naval ROTC students who wanted to follow in his footsteps.
Trouble is, they were lying.
Smith, Brodrick and Whitely are among a growing nest of military imposters, people who make up military careers or exaggerate their service.
Such lies might seem harmless, especially when legitimate veterans have been known to tell aggrandized tales to make their service seem a bit more exciting. But it's a source of frustration for those who truly earned such accolades, and in many cases it's a violation of federal law.
(Excerpt) Read more at military.com ...
Big bertha with a scope. LOLOLOLOLOL!
Ha! I’ve got you beat. I defended Bunker Hill and the Alamo. I charged Cemetery Ridge and San Juan Hill. I survived Pearl Harbor and the Song Tay raid. Not bad for a guy who is only 31, don’t you think? ;-)
Should have told him it was time to leave, but not with the uniform.
Why you young pup. I was in the Velociraptor Cavalry.
Funny you'd mention Son Tay. The guy I worked for claimed to have been on the Son Tay raid. I've twice seen comprehensive lists of all participants down to the cooks and bakers level, and his name isn't present. Not even anything at all close.
I think his h.s. football team ought to get a piece of him too, since he turned himself into a star player on a team he never played for (not nearly as bad as faking military heroics, but, still what a pathetic POS):
"And, as if claiming heroic involvement in nearly all of the eras significant historical events wasnt enough, he told the Globe hed scored the winning touchdown in the last game of his senior year in high school."
All were awarded posthumously. ;-)
My GGGG Grandfather was a Quartermaster- for the 1st NJ Volunteer Cavalry. During the War he took a saber cut and was shot twice. Moved out west to California, married GGGG Grandma in a hotel that still stands, and the rest is history.
That particular Quartermaster, was a card-carrying battling hard case.
It has been my life long experience that the ones who did the service and faced the hell, don't talk about it. Not unless you get real close to them.
I was my great grandfather's orderly in the War of 1812.
The latest impostor turned up last week and was pretty funny. He claimed to be a Longmont detective and would turn up in porn shops demanding free porn to screen for underage performers.
Wow! Really? Did you know Johnny Horton? :-)
They are in trouble because they couldn’t brave sniper fire in Bosnia when Air Force “broom stick 1” almost crash landed on the “hot tarmac”
Wow, must be something about Fort Lauderdale. I was reading through this and was going to post my story when i saw yours.
I got suckered pretty good there. I tend to believe people when they tell me things. A one legged old man with his wife came up the brow of the ship when I was there and asked for a tour.
I was the Command Senior Chief and happened to be standing in the area and nothing much was going on and I gave him and his wife the full treatment. At some point he told me he was a Medal of Honor awardee. I remember notifying the CDO and Captain that he was on board because people with that award are entitled to military honors. He requested that no fuss be made and he invited me out to dinner and took me out to a pretty nice place.
Among other things, he was a POW in Vietnam. He had lost his teeth during the damage control effort on the Forrestal, and he had lost his leg in the bombing of the Marine Barracks in Beirut. He then served on the Secretary of the Navy’s staff. He told me he had retired as a Chief Signalman.
I was enjoying my meal in a nice restaurant with the couple and was asking some polite questions about all this when I chanced to ask him exactly how he had lost his teeth during the Forrestal damage control effort. He kind of froze up and gave me a pretty vague answer. That took the curtain off the wizard for me. I was pretty sure that if somebody or something knocked my teeth out I would remember exactly how that happened. This whole time the old lady had been looking at him admiringly and nodding while he told his tales.
I didn’t ask too many more questions and they took me back to the ship. I was kind of saddened by the whole thing and didn’t pursue it in any way. I’ve heard other stories that were kind of questionable but none as egregious as that one.
It’s always SEALS or Special Forces. Never heard of an impostor claiming to have served in the Quartermaster Corps. :-))
same with geneology and hypnosis-induced past lives. always a king, never seen anyone claim to be descended from a stableboy
I ran into a WWII Vet (Battle of the Bulge) in Fort Collins (CO) last month. He was with family and seemed the genuine article.
The porn inspector is a great story. Imagine what his jail time is like!
.....and fighting; the Romans, at Old Cartage....Tunis with Hannibal, too.
Well, that seems original to me, but I don’t get out much. He probably got the idea from a story on the Internet.
I was a High-Speed Buffer Operator at Ft. Ord.
On K.P., I always wanted to get promoted to D.R.O. (Dining Room Orderly), but somehow I always ended up being a Pots-and-Pans Man.
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