Nick DeLong, Air Force Veteran

Nick DeLong may not have fought in hand-to-hand combat but, one fact is for sure, he was a driving force behind those who did. Although if you happened to mention such a compliment to him, all you might get in reply would be a shrug and humble chuckle. Humility has been ingrained in his being and shines through in the way he speaks of his experiences.

If you asked him to sum up his experiences in a brief statement, he, would probably tell you that his twenty-two years of service were filled with many opportunities and many drawbacks. These experiences, both good and bad, make up who he is today. Please join us as we journey through twenty-two years of informational and unique stories of one man’s time spent in the Air Force.

I was born in Chillicothe, Ohio, February 1954. [My parents’ names were] Ellen and Nolan DeLong. I have a sister, Janet a brother Rodney, a younger sister Rebecca Anne. I lived there until I was seven and my parents got divorced and I moved here to Missouri where my grandparents lived. We originally lived in Pierce City, Missouri; and then, we eventually moved to Joplin. So [that is where I settled for most of my young life], until I was out of high school. I was there until I was eighteen.

I've been married four times. I have had four children. Three are living now. Two live with me now. My two youngest daughters live with me now, [their names are] Monica and Nicole, they're ten and twelve. Now, my oldest son will be thirty. My youngest son is deceased; he's deceased since 1995. That's my four children.

My father, course he was in the military, course at that time it was mandatory that everyone had to be in the military that was capable of going into the military; but that was before I was born. I was never around the military when I was growing up. I didn't really have much knowledge of the military until I got old enough to listen to it on the radio and on the TV. 'Cause you listen to the military stories a lot during the ‘60s and ‘70s.

I didn't originally want to go into the military. Course at that time Vietnam was going on, but I really didn't want to go into the military. Course that was during the draft at that time I thought I was going to get out of it, I wasn't going to have to go to the draft. Course I went to the selection, you had to go in and get your physical and get classified and all that. At that time, they had so much controversy over what people were being selected for the draft. They had a lottery based on your social security number, and they would broadcast the lottery on the TV. So, everyone would know who was actually selected and who wasn't because it went by your social security number. So if anyone knew your social security number, they knew that you had been selected. It was easy to track and find who had been selected. I really didn't think [I was going to be drafted]. I thought they were going to end the draft in July of 1972. So I took my physical in February, and I thought, "Well, there's only four or five months left, I will be lucky I won't get drafted." Well, in the end of May they had the thing on the news and they had had my social security number and they said these numbers will be drafted and I thought, "Well, that won't happen because it's only a month away.” Well, two weeks later I got my notice saying,

"Well, you've got two weeks to show up for the draft.”

Course the draft was for the army. The air force and the marines, they don't draft. It's only for the army. I didn't want to go to the army because I knew if I went to the army I'd go to Vietnam. I just kind of didn't know what I was going to do. I don't remember if I even said anything to [my family] about it at the time. At the time, there was a lot of people that just didn't go. A lot of people went to Canada, Mexico. A lot of people just left and didn't go because they didn't want to go. Well, I didn't know [if that was an option for me] because it was a big decision, you know, I didn't know what I was going to do. I just couldn't see doing, you know, going the other way. So, I went down and so I said, ‘Well, I'm not going to go in the army.’ I originally went down to go see the navy or the coast guard and they weren't there that day. I really didn't want to go into the air force because in the air force you had to go in for four years versus the army which is two years. I didn't want to make that commitment, but eventually I did. I went ahead and joined the [Air Force]. I'm glad I did now. Now that I was there and I saw the way you were actually treated, your living conditions, and the way you had to live I was glad I went into the Air Force. Your lifestyle was better. You know, you were treated better. You had much more challenging, I thought, [more] challenging fields than what I thought the army or the navy would have. So I was glad I went into the air force, in the long run, yeah.

[My branch of service was] course Air Force. Well my rank, when I retired after twenty-two years, was master sergeant. I don't really know all the grades. In all the services [the grades] are different. The navy are petty officers and different kind of seamen and the army is different. Everyone is different in what they call their grades. [However], they're all the same when it comes to pay grade. The pay grade for the services are all the same, E-one through E-nine. I was an E-Seven, and in the Air Force that was a master sergeant. That was two grades below the highest level.

I learned a lot in the military. I mean I had a lot of nice experiences, a lot of good experiences. Course at the same time there was a lot of bad experiences too. In the air force course one of the advantages was your lifestyle. You lived better and the work was more challenging; but on the other hand, in the air force your pay generally worked out to be less from the other grades 'cause in the other grades you could progress faster-- like you could become a sergeant or a staff sergeant in the army in about two years. Course in the air force it took about six years. So, basically their pay was three times faster or higher than our pay grade was 'cause they could reach their ranks higher. Course they lost their ranks faster. Course the turnover of people was faster, so, some people might not even be in long enough to reach that grade. But in the air force you have to meet requirements, certain requirements, to progress in grade. It's not just as long as I'm there I just automatically get a grade. My understanding of some of the grades, pay grades, in the army [is that] they're just automatic. You don't necessarily have to meet the requirements and things, where in the air force there's more competition. We're pretty competitive. You have to test for your grades. You take a test, a promotion test. When you get into the sergeants, E-One through E-Three are basically automatic, as long as you meet your job requirements and your evaluations are okay. You'll automatically progress as long as you do what you're supposed to do. But once you get past that point, your grade progression is competitive. It's based on your test scores. You have to take a test, a promotion test. That test is based on air force knowledge. It's a test that's mainly taken by everyone in every field. Then you also have a skill knowledge test after you meet certain requirements in your skill. So, that's also a scored grade. If I remember right, there’s also a weighted airman. Weighted airman promotion, and it's based on test scores, proficiency testing. It's based on awards and honors, and it's also based on the availability of grade. There's only so many people [that] can be a certain grade, and they only need one person, and there's sixty of you testing. There's only going to be [one] person out of sixty testing that's going to get that grade. So, sometimes it's very competitive.

[My opinions about Vietnam were that] it didn’t seem to be serving any purpose. Of course, I'd been listening to it and watching it for so long. Heard so many stories about. It was the biggest topic of conversation, and it affected everybody's lives so much. I had friends that died there, and I knew people that died there. It just didn't seem like it had a purpose. They didn't (pause) seem like they had a goal, like they had, "We're going to do this, and this is what we're going to do; and we'll stick to a plan." [They] didn't really have a big plan that I could tell. So, no, I didn't want to go there. I didn't want to be involved in the war; but I thought, "The best way to hide is in plain sight." I did get drafted I said, "Well, at least I'm going to choose some of my destiny."

No one that I knew personally [chose the route that I had chosen myself]. No one that I knew personally did. I knew a lot of guys that were real gung-ho for the war, and they wanted to go to the war so they joined the marines. [That] wasn't my style though.

I was never into combat I was always in a supporting role, that’s the way I wanted it. I didn't want to be in an active role in combat. If I was going to be involved, I wanted to be in a supporting role. So, one way I knew how to do that is to first of all, to pick a field, a career field that didn't necessarily have to do with combat. At the time I thought, "Well, you know, I'll go into the civil engineers.” I would work in the engineering field because that really doesn't relate to combat. Well, I found out later that that's not necessarily true in the military. They always find a combat role for you. Course once you get out of basic training, which is a pretty big experience for everyone, to go through basic training. There was the first time I realized that sometimes what they tell you isn't always the way it is. Like they told you, "Well, it's just going to be six weeks and you're going to, six weeks and that's it and you will be gone." It doesn't work out that way. It doesn't always work that way. 'Cause like six weeks, I thought, was forty-five days. Well, forty-five days doesn't count weekends [and] it doesn't count holidays, certain days it doesn't count. It ends up working to where you're there longer than what you originally think you're going to be there. Sixty of us went into the basic training and only thirty-five of us made it through basic training; or it was even less, maybe thirty. 'Cause I was thinking only fifty percent of us completed because so many people drop out. Aren't able to complete basic training for one reason or another. It's a lot of different reasons. People get sick, people aren't motivated, they're overweight, they can't keep up with the physical demands, because it's pretty demanding physically. People can't keep up with the mental challenge, a lot of mental pressure. A lot of people can't handle that either. So, it ends up about fifty percent of people make it through originally. Some people go back. They have to go start over again. Some people have to go through what they call motivation training--those are for people a lot of times that don't really want to work hard at something. A lot of people are overweight or not physically strong enough. They put them into a motivation squadron to loose weight, or they put them through physical training to make them strong enough so they can get through the demands. 'Cause you have a lot of physical demands. Course even in basic training you go through a lot of school, and you go through a lot of the training: how to fire weapons, the proper way to following commands, marching, and all those kinds of things. Before I went into the service I was a normal kid. I'd get up, you know, my room would be a mess or whatever. But when I come back from basic training, I went home to my parent’s house. The next morning at five thirty I was up. I jumped up out of bed at five thirty. [I] made my bed, tightened it up. Man, it was just tighter than, you know, you could hear it when you touched it. I made the bed real right. I got up, did the shaving, and got all dressed. At six o'clock, I was ready to go. I always laugh about that because, you know, they trained me to be there at six o'clock, you know. So, it was a big change. In that six week period they change you a lot. [The sergeants were] very intimidating, very intimidating. Yes, they definitely get right up in your face, and you have to be strong enough to not break down 'cause a lot of people would just break down. You had people that would get so scared they would just pass out. [It was, at times,] so bad they would wet [themselves]; they would urinate. It’s pretty extreme.

I remember the one thing I looked forward to while I was there was to go to church. That was the only time that you didn't have a T.I. [Training Instructor] on you. That was the only time that you could release some emotions. In the church there, at the time, they had a band that played there and sang. They had a band, you know, with guitars and drums, and it was loud. They played loud rock music, that was the way they played and had their gospel singing and stuff. I'd never experienced that kind of church before either, you know. They sang like that and had music like that. It was [a] release of emotion there. So, it was very exciting. Plus, that was the only place there were females. It was the only place you could see a female 'cause at that time they kept you separated. The guys and the girls, that was the only time they mixed. I thought that was fun.

Step one, that was basic training. So, I went to training as a structural technician. Which is basically a carpenter; but you, you worked with different structures and stuff. You know, and after that I went to, my first assignment was in Florida. [It was at] Ft. Walton beach Florida. So I thought, "Oh, great, that’s all right. On the beach,” I'm thinking, "Oh, that's great!" So, I get there and they say,

"Oh, well you're going to a special squadron,” [They said,]..."Okay, you're going to a combat engineering squadron."

Normally they have a civil engineer [that] maintains the air base, that is assigned to the air base, and they maintain the base structures. Well, also at that time they had a new squadron that had been created during Vietnam. They moved. It was the first time that the air force had to, you know, set up bases--maintain bases overseas, and set up airfields, and all that kind of stuff. So, they created this combat engineering squad. That’s the first experience, I think, that the air force had. Course, you know, the navy had C.B.'s; but that was the first time they [the Air Force] created this. Well, they were combat engineers. So when I got there, I found out that the squadron was assigned to Vietnam. We rotated every six months to Vietnam and maintained the bases in Vietnam and in Asia. All over, basically, all over Asia. Because once out of that squadron in Vietnam, you traveled all throughout Southeast Asia maintaining the bases all over, you know. Most of the bases were established bases where the air planes were at and they weren't like out in the bush, or out in the field generally; they were maintained, you know, established bases. Even though, during the time I was with that squadron we trained for bare base operations. That was another Special Forces. We trained with the special operations for bare base operations. So, they had to train us in weapons; they had to train us in machine guns. I had to go to Las Vegas to train with machine guns and heavier weapons and M-Sixteens, hand guns, all these kind of weapons. They trained you how to establish perimeters and how you would train your fuel to fire. Course then we had our training as far as setting up the base. We had to set up temporary bases or semi-permanent temporary bases, where they would bring in people, a large number of people. Then we would have to set up a field runways and it required, we called it AM-Two matting. Basically it was two-foot by eight-foot pieces of aluminum sheeting. You would lay those down, you would have to level off the field, lay 'em down, and them lock 'em in with pins. You would do that for a whole airfield. It would be, uh, let me see what was it? [It was] a thousand by five thousand, which was a field runway, five thousand feet. We actually, at one time, we built a ten thousand-foot runway with AM-Two matting. So many thousand feet across and so many thousand feet down. I think it was ten thousand feet almost. It took us a month working twenty-four hours a day out in a field.

But most of our time was spent training for war. We would train for war all the time, constantly training for war. Whether, even when I was assigned to this combat squadron we would be training for war a lot of times. When I was assigned to the air bases overseas or in the states, most of your time was spent training for war. I had a lot of combat training while I was with the combat engineers. Sometimes we would spend months out in the fields. They would take us out sometimes in trucks or sometimes they'd even fly us into the combat area, to our simulated combat area. They'd drop us off. Sometimes they'd have to take us in with helicopters. They'd drop us into a field, and they'd bring in our equipment and we would have to level out [a mountain]. One time I remember we did it in Alabama. They took us in and dropped us off on the top of a mountain, and we'd have to level off the top of that mountain with the heavy equipment. First, we had to go out and set up perimeters with machine guns and weapons, and set up guards and things, and try to secure our area--so to keep from being attacked. Then we leveled off the top of that mountain, and set up a base up there. Mainly, it was for radar and for communications site up there. [We would] set up a perimeter, and set up water, showers, eating facilities. Once we did that then they brought in the army. They brought the army guys in after they sent us in to secure the area and set up the bases. They brought the army guys in, and we were up on the top of that mountain for a month with them for the exercise. We went two weeks ahead of them to set up the base. We were there for a month with them; and they left, and we were there two more weeks taking it all back down. So, it was two months we were out there in the field with them. In the three years I spent with them, I spent two years in training, away. So, the three years I was assigned to Florida I only spent one year in Florida. The rest of the two years I spent all over the place. All over the U.S. in different training environments. We went to Alaska, Panama, Turkey, where else? Oh, we went to the Azores, I was in the Azores for, what was it, eight months. I spent a lot of time traveling during that time, the first three years I was in the service.

[My favorite place to be, throughout my years of service was] out of the places I visited, I liked Germany. Where I spent the most time was in Germany. I liked Germany. It was for a lot of reasons. Well, it had the most modern environment. The people were the most educated [in Germany]. They had a lot of culture in [Germany]. [I even learned a bit of German too because] I spent five years in Germany. Yeah, during that time I was married to a German. [I spent] five years there, and during that time I was married to a German. Her family lived in Northern Germany, they call it Northrei Vespatin. Her sister lived in Holland, in Denhaug. So, we spent a lot of time in Holland and Germany. Course when we were with her family they didn't speak English. The first year or two we had to translate back and forth. You know, we'd have to kind of go in between each other to try to (pause) understand what was going on. Gradually, you know, gradually I started to understand what they were saying. Of course, at that time, I also took some conversational German courses to try to understand more. Gradually I started to understand what they were saying. Then after I started to understand some of what they were saying, I would try to respond. The hardest part is trying to respond. (Laughs) I didn't want to sound too stupid. I never was really very good at German, but you know, I'd gotten pretty accustom to it.

Actually, after five years in my work I had a lot of Germans working for me. In civil engineering, that was another thing. The work force was always civil, half civilian, half military. So you worked more in a civilian environment rather than a military environment where a lot of military squadrons were all military.

[In the air force] I learned that when you go in, you have your own goals and your own ideas of what you want to accomplish or where you want to go and things you want to do. Well, that's all good and well; but you're not there to satisfy your needs. I learned that you're there to satisfy the air force's needs. You find out that you're not there for your goals. Whatever is to their benefit; and if it goes along with what you want then that's fine and good, but if it doesn't, their needs, their requirements come first. You know, and that was a little bit upsetting at some times. It got a little frustrating, yes.

Some of the more extreme times that I can remember that really frustrated me was when my daughter was supposed to be born. I had an assignment to go to Korea. My assignment date to Korea was to arrive no later than the first, or the third of January. Well, my daughter was due to be born on the twenty-fifth of December. Well, I didn't want to leave and I was going to a remote assignment. My family wasn't allowed to go. So I had to leave without my family for a year, which I didn't want to do anyway. I spent most of my career trying to avoid doing that, leaving my family. But it didn’t work out that way. I requested to not have to go until, you know, a few months later--give my wife time to recover from having a baby and to adjust to having a new baby and stuff. I didn’t have a cooperative commander at the Korean base, ‘cause they’re the ones that say “yes” or “no.” They just automatically denied it. They didn’t even consider the request. I had an opportunity to ask him why. He said, “Because, that’s just how it is. Yeah, that’s just how it is.” A lot of the military they like to think, “Well, you’re not here for your family. You’re here for us. You’re in the air force, not your family. We don’t have to consider your family.” Which is not a really good way to look at it if you’re a family person. Those are some frustrating points. Yeah, and also at the same time, I was also in a graduate program at the time and I was only a few courses away from completing my graduate degree.

Well, a lot of the good things is I had a lot of job experiences. You get job experiences, you know. You receive a lot of training, a lot of opportunity for education. You also have a lot of demanding jobs where you might be in charge of numbers of people, equipment, schedules, and a lot of important positions. Where [as] in the regular life you would never get the opportunity to have that kind of responsibility, experience, and training. It would be unlikely you’d be able to do that especially as a young person. So, those are good points.

One of the jobs that was demanding that I enjoyed the most was being what they called a “Saber Contractor.” [As a Saber Contractor you] took over the positions of different engineering fields. You would do the planning, and the plans, and the pricing of contracts, and awards and inspections. You’d do the whole project from start to finish. You’d also involved a contractor and you would, you know, work with a contractor to complete the project and stuff. It was very demanding, but interesting at the same time it was very satisfying. You know, so it was a very good experience.

One experience I had that I didn’t enjoy too much was [when] I wanted to go back to Europe. They wouldn’t let me stay any longer than five years in Germany. I liked Europe and I wanted to stay longer but they said, “No, five years, that’s it. You’ve got to go back to the states, you’ve got to go back.” You can’t stay too long [in one assignment]. To get back to Europe the only assignment available to me at the time was a special assignment. That was to go to England. I thought that was good too because in the civil engineering field you couldn’t be assigned to go to England. The assignment was for England, so I thought that would be good. The special assignment [was]working for the U.S. postal service for the military. Course [you had to] go to training, to U.S. postal training school to learn to be a postal worker.

So I thought, ‘Well, I’ll go; and you know, just pitch some letters. You know, I’ll just sort mail and deliver some mail.’ Well, I get to England and find out [that] because of my rank [I was the only person that could fill the chief master sergeant slot]. I was a lower enlisted grade, but they didn’t have anyone else to fill the slot.

So, when I got there I find out, “Well, you’re in training right now, ‘cause you’re going to take my job, you’re going to be in charge.”

[In this] field you do administrative work [such as] reports [and] filing. Well, I’d never been in administration. I’d always been in construction and contracting. So I get there and I was really totally unprepared to do that job. It didn’t really necessarily involve pitching the mail, I just had eighteen [enlisted] employees working for me who did that. The postal field was very demanding administratively because you had so many reports and so many people you worked for. Basically you worked for the U.S. postal service in the U.S.; but we worked under the military postal service. You had different headquarters and different people you had to report to. I think I had like a hundred and twenty additional duty tasks that were assigned to me. I was the same as an officer, commander. I had to do court marshals and administrative procedures on people. I had to be able to do things that a commander would normally do and prepare all the paper work [and reports] that was required for it. All your reports [were done by] typewriters. I’d never typed before I went to the postal school [so] I couldn’t even hardly type. I was typing twenty page reports everyday so I had to go back to school and learn how to type. Plus, we worked twenty-four hours a day. We had three shifts [which] worked a twenty-four hour day. Plus, I was responsible for all the trucks that went back and forth to London, and I was responsible for two other sites smaller than me. One of them was in Liverpool, which was an army base. So, I had to be responsible for all their reporting and all their stuff. You had all the money orders [and] all your mails. Registered mail, which could be classified. Stuff had to be secured [and] had to be tracked all the time. All the signatures had to be right and every “I” had to be dotted. [In addition], we were constantly being inspected. I probably worked seventy, eighty hours, [seven days] a week and I was there for three years. When I left there, [I received] nothing to show for it. I just, worked, and worked, and worked. I felt lucky just to get out of there.

[To keep in contact with my family, when I was gone I] mainly [wrote] letters, mainly letters because telephone conversations where much too expensive. When I was in Germany it was in the ‘70s, they had a call radio. They had radio communications where you could call [and] they would say, “This is such and such holding for...” You’d call and it would go bounce over stations back and forth. [Then] they connect to an operator back in the states, and you could get a radio contact right back to your home. There was no charge and they’d let you talk for like thirty minutes (or however much time, depending on what time of the day it was). Each time you’d do it you’d have to say, “Over.” There’d always be an echo in the background, “Over, over, over, over, over.” That was one way to do it. ‘Cause at the time you’d have to use German phone lines and German phones were very expensive. Everything in Germany was very expensive.

[To live in Germany] they had to pay you a lot of extra money [because] it was much more expensive. Your housing was very expensive. Electricity, what they considered luxuries, were very expensive. [In addition], we’re used to paying our bill every month, Well, they don’t do that. In Germany you might not get a bill for a year. [It was] all one big lump sum. You had to try to save money for six months to be able to pay [your bills]. A lot of people, myself included, didn’t realize that. Every six months you get a bill, and some people would get that bill and it would be six thousand dollars. They’d have to go in debt [and] borrow money to try to pay their bills. Electricity was the same way. You only got your bill like every six months. They don’t explain it they just say, “This is how it is. This is how we do it in Germany.”

It was quite an eye-opener going to Germany. [Like I said] during that time I got married to the German woman. That changed things. [I thought], “I’ll just go ahead and re-enlist for another time in Germany.” ‘Cause you can extend your length of service or the time of your assignment. So, I thought, “Well, I’ll just keep extending as long as I want to stay in Germany.” ‘Cause it met my wants and it met the air force’s needs. So, I just kept extending [and the] next thing I know, well, you’ve been here five years. You’re going to have to re-enlist or get out. You can’t extend any more, you can only extend so many times. I said, “Well, if that’s my choice I guess I’ll...” and then they said,

“Well, you can. You can re-enlist if you take another assignment and extend in Germany somewhere.”

So, I did. I ended up staying there for five years and re-enlisted. I had almost nine years in by the time I finished my Germany assignment. Well, it wasn’t long [before] they said,

“Well, if you don’t re-enlist, as soon as you get back to the states you’re out. You’re out on the street, that’s it.”

So, I [didn’t] want to get back to the states with a family [and] end up on a street in New York with no car, no home, no job, no nothing. The only way to avoid that is to re-enlist again.

“You’ve got to re-enlist again and you’ll get re-assigned in the States. We will give you a list of choices of your assignments in the states, right?”

So, I said, “Well for the benefit of my family and everything, I’ll go ahead and re-enlist again. Take a state-side assignment.”

That’s what I did. Course then I’ve got thirteen years in. Well, heck, I’m half way there. I only have to do twenty to retire. Then next thing I know, I got this assignment to England which I thought was a good thing, but it turned out to be not such a good thing. You get that done [and] there’s sixteen years. [After that], I’ve only got one more enlistment and I’ve got twenty in.

When I came back from Germany, I went to Robin’s Air Force in Georgia and that was an okay assignment. It was to a MAC [Material Acquisition Command] Base. They had different kinds of bases that had different kinds of functions; and a MAC Base was a supply depot. They just had supplies. It wasn’t a combat assignment. It was a pretty good assignment in that sense. When I came back from England, I went to Warnerob in Georgia, which is right on the Florida border. I ended up being there [in Florida] twice, actually. After I came back from Korea, I was assigned to Texas. The Texas assignment was a whole different story ‘cause I was assigned to the intelligence command. I didn’t really want to take [the assignment], but they didn’t give me a choice. It was either take that job or take a job up in Loring, Maine, somewhere it snowed eleven months out of the year. I thought, “I don’t want to go to Loring, Maine ‘cause it’s a very bad assignment.”

As you can tell, one of the things most anticipated was our next assignment. Wherever you were at, you were waiting for your next assignment. Sometimes they were good, and sometimes they weren’t so good.

One of the best advantages I had that the service provided was education. That was one of the things that they always stressed a lot and encouraged. There was a lot of different educational programs you could take advantage of while you were in [the Air Force]. They [also] have a community college of the air force. You could proceed to an associate degree with the community college of the air force in whatever specialty force you were in. In my case I was in engineering and received my associate degree in engineering technology. At the same time when I took those special duties, I was in the administrative field. I completed the courses I needed to get my associate degree and in the administrative field as well. After that, I wanted to get my bachelor’s degree. So I got my bachelors degree in general studies with an engineering background. All these programs were paid for by the air force. So I would say, probably one of the best benefits I got out of the service was the education that I received.

[] Indicates words were not said by Nick DeLong.

This oral history was researched and prepared by Laura Clothier, 2003.