The name Tango Mike/Mike had become synonymous with my given name, Roy P. Benavidez. Apparently it was much easier to pronounce and remember than the… - Roy Benavidez

The Koreans treated us all the same, too. A lot of them liked us, or tried to. Most Koreans really appreciated the American blood that was spilled on their soil to help maintain their freedom. Some didn't. To some few, a distinct minority, we were just another group of invaders, like the Japanese in the last war and the Chinese before them. They could hardly be blamed for feeling that way after living for so many years with foreigners in their land.
Getting to know the Koreans helped me to begin to develop an understanding about the cost of freedom. Not all of the Koreans were Slicky Boys. The Korean soldiers I worked with were excellent. The ROK Army soldiers and Marines were much less well equipped, fed, and paid than we were, but they were committed to doing what they could to preserve their five-thousand-year-old culture. They had an intense hatred for communism that I would see again when some of them fought in Vietnam.

Korea was becoming somewhat civilized, at least for the commissioned officers stationed there. An officers' club had been established near the artillery company's camp, and a three-quarter-ton truck was en route to it carrying a supply of liquor. The truck broke down, and foolishly the driver decided to go for help. I was told that a GI named Gotch-Eye Ireland happened on that truck while the driver was away from it, examined it, and discovered its contents. Gotch-Eye hurried back to his battery, then went to the motor pool to obtain a three-quarter-ton vehicle and some help in order that he might "liberate" that whiskey. The people in the motor pool, of course, had to be involved, for the motor pool sergeant had to sign off on the truck.
The soldiers "liberated" the bourbon, scotch, gin, and vodka, leaving sissy liquor such as creme de menthe and sherry for the officers. They hid the truck, and when night fell they removed the bottles from it and took them into the hills. At daylight, MPs conducted a tent-to-tent search but found no trace of the liquor. The captain who commanded the battery called a meeting of all the noncoms. "I am upset," he said, "but I will be even more upset if I do not have periodically in my tent a bottle of bourbon. If I do not, I will take further action. I will see that another search is conducted and that the perpetrators of this incident are court-martialed."
Needless to say, the captain got his bourbon. Apparently, he thought as the dogfaces, who could only get three-two beer, did- that the liquor would be wasted on some of the shavetail second lieutenants who drank at the officers' club. The enlisted men used to say of the second lieutenants that their motto was, "We're gentlemen because we're officers." The GI's response was, "Yeah, but it took an Act of Congress to make you one."

When President Reagan placed the Congressional Medal of Honor around my neck, it all came racing back to me. The blood flooding the floor of the helicopter and gushing out of the doors as we banked and ran from that Cambodian jungle. The sights and sounds of my six hours in hell. The agony of the wounded and dying kept repetitively flashing through my mind while I watched the honor guard and heard the president, my commander-in-chief, read the details of the award. I was not ashamed of the tears that blinded my eyes.