Ron Kovic releases new book; talks past, present, personal and national

Redondo Beach resident Ron Kovic, pictured in 2016 when his second book, “Hurricane Street,” was published. Photo by David Fairchild

by Garth Meyer

A story of a man who has fought to live, mentally and physically, Ron Kovic’s newly-published third book, “A Dangerous Country; An American Elegy,” includes a year-long war diary from the paralyzed Vietnam veteran and Redondo Beach resident.

The author of the 1976 bestseller “Born on the Fourth of July” had never before shared the diary publicly, nor much at all.

The entries start before his second tour of duty, for which Kovic put forth his name 13 times until the Marines called him to re-enlist. 

He had planned to open the new book with a chapter titled, “A Violent Spring.”

I would look at the diary – but it was painful and a bit traumatic,” Kovic said of the first years after he came back from the war. “I would have anxiety attacks and nightmares after reading what I did. So I was very careful about going back to it. But I held onto it. I just wanted to forget it. Now I feel a distance. I could not have written this book 10 years ago, or five years ago. I wasn’t ready to expose that yet. My girlfriend read it and encouraged me to put it in the book. I knew it could be embarrassing, at the same time I was proud of the diary.”

The writings are the voice of Tom Cruise’s character in the 1989, Academy Award-winning movie, directed by Oliver Stone, clear and direct, full of purpose and belief.

“I finally went up to her and told her I was going to Vietnam for another year,” Kovic wrote on July 26, 1967, about a girl back home, before he left for Camp Pendleton to train a platoon as a sergeant. “She didn’t show any emotion but I know it hit her pretty hard; from that moment on she was never the same. She just acted nice and friendly. She has much poise and is a wonderful girl. I think if I would have met her six months ago I wouldn’t be going back. But what’s done is done and I shall never regret it.”

As the diary shows, the war does not escape Kovic’s questioning, but he is assured in his belief that his country needs him.

At age 21, he leads a black-bereted patrol of 14 men, based near the Cuet River, Vietnam. 

After Wilson, a squad member from Georgia is killed by Kovic in a split-second incident of friendly fire, his tone in the diary cools, he writes of feeling “lousy” but does not say more. 

Later, in the book, he reveals details.

As a platoon leader, Kovic prayed the rosary, and never ate before all of his men did.

“I was trying to be the best Marine, a good leader, an authentic leader,” he said. 

By late 1967, three months into his second tour, he wrote in the diary that he was done with the war: “I want out. I’ve had enough.”

He tells of how Wilson, among his belongings, had a book titled “How to Survive in Vietnam.”

Ultimately, though, Kovic concludes in the diary that, “If I am going to let this war get me down, I’ll be nothing better than those punks back in the States telling us to come home.”

He writes of hearing of others in the camp saying Sgt. Kovic is “too gung ho.”

He was shot and wounded, through the shoulder and spinal cord, in January 1968. The diary was sent to Kovic’s parents’ house in Massapequa, Long Island, in his “sea bag” – his possessions from the base tent.

Ron Kovic is now 77 years old, looking back and looking forward. The following interview took place in several sessions from April to June.

 

Did you show the diary to Oliver Stone?

I never showed it to Oliver Stone. I didn’t want to (show it to people). Eventually, it’s ironic that I decided to share it with as many people as possible. I wanted to show that innocence; as a young man growing up in the ‘50s whose parents both served, from a very patriotic community on Long Island. I wanted to represent what America might have been at the entry point to that war. That diary represented the innocence of America, in many ways.

Why did the Marines turn you down 13 times when you sought a second tour?

I remember an officer wrote back saying I was being too “flowery,” too patriotic. I had been born on the Fourth of July, I believed like the fathers in my neighborhood who had won World War II. Both of my uncles were in World War II and Korea. My grandfather served in World War I. 

When I was nine years old, my uncle gave me a Marine Corps guidebook (from Korea).

… [Then] I become a protester… I wanted people to know the cost of war, what war really does to human beings. War is frightening, you’re trying to stay alive, you’re in this horrific cauldron. I think policemen understand… My first tour of duty I remember walking point, imagining I was in a movie, John Wayne living out a celluloid fantasy. When I came back injured, some of my childhood friends said, ‘I told you so,’ I have forgiven them. I forgive the person who shot me, the politicians as well… what did they know…?

“Red Badge of Courage,” did these books ever warn people about what war could do to you? There’s got to be ways to avoid war. We’re an intelligent, creative people, there has to be a nonviolent, diplomatic solution. To start with, most of all, we need to respect each other.

 

Ron Kovic leads a group of disabled veterans from the Wilshire Boulevard Federal Building in Los Angeles in 1974, at the end of a hunger strike and 19-day occupation of Sen. Alan Cranston’s offices. The protestors were demanding better treatment for wounded Vietnam veterans. Photo by Cal Montney, Los Angeles Times (WikiCommons)

 

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When writing “Born On the Fourth of July”  – largely in an apartment in Santa Monica – Kovic said he felt as if it was a last will and testament. He never imagined what it would turn into.

After he finished the manuscript, he and a fellow Vietnam veteran set up a post at the Chelsea Hotel in New York and fanned out to publishing houses to try to sell it. 

Later, as it was being released, the first inkling of what the book would become was when a woman friend in the art department of the New York Times invited Kovic to dinner with her husband and showed him the front cover of the New York Times Book Review, featuring his book.

Kovic’s mindset is much different in “A Dangerous Country”; he said he wanted to pick up the rest of the story from where it left off. 

Almost 10 years after “Born On the Fourth of July” (the book) came out,  Kovic was still struggling with anxiety, panic attacks and depression. He said he was at a breaking point when he received a phone call from a friend that led to a lasting resolution.

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The phone call, how important was that?

I was tormented inside. I was experiencing what many thousands of young men who came back from that war went through. I’m just grateful to still be here after all these years… I’ve left that bitterness behind. This book is about healing, a journey toward redemption, finding joy in life despite paralysis. To be able to emerge to a new day. All it takes is one person to call you on the phone. I wonder how many more people would be alive if they had gotten the call I did.

To what do you attribute the change?

A spiritual experience, I had renewed my faith. I believe there is something more powerful than me. I believe I had gone through a spiritual experience, and found a certain faith that I had lost… If I have any encouragement it is, ‘don’t give up, don’t give up.’ We all go through these difficult times, to reach out to others, hang in there. During difficult times you may feel like you are the only one.

I thank God for my decision not to give up, despite such a catastrophic injury, paralyzed from the chest down. I’m very grateful that I never gave up. It taught me more understanding, compassion. It taught me to be more tolerant. I am as proud to have become a peacemaker as I was to be a Marine Corps sergeant.

 

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Kovic’s transformation into an anti-war protester with Vietnam Veterans Against the War led to 12 arrests, a hunger strike, disrupting the 1972 Republican Convention in Miami, and speaking at the 1976 Democratic Convention in New York.

The cover quote on his new book, written by Bruce Springsteen, says Kovic became “one of America’s great voices on war and what it does to the body and soul.”

His second book, “Hurricane Street” (2016) chronicled the 1974 two-and-a-half-week sit-in and hunger strike in the Wilshire Boulevard offices of then U.S. Senator Alan Cranston, on behalf of better treatment of injured and disabled veterans.

After the “Born On the Fourth of July” movie came out, Kovic thought of challenging Orange County Congressman Robert Dornan for Congress.

He chose not to.

I had such a public life, with the countless speeches,” Kovic said, “And then the movie, I was really hoping to move in a different direction. I wanted to focus on writing.”

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In “A Dangerous Country,” you write of how, as a child, your uncle Paul, a schizophrenic, was  beaten to death in a mental hospital on Long Island. And about how your mother, an alcoholic, had a breakdown and left the family for a time. What was that like?

She had shock treatments. Do they still do that today? I remember after she came back, she would just sit, staring at the T.V. for the longest time. My father was a saint, in many ways, the manager of A&P (grocery store), I loved my mother, later he told me how difficult it had been at times with her. But he stayed… 

My mother was deeply affected by what happened to me. I remember one time she said, ‘I hate what they did in that damn war to you.’

Did mental illness run in the family?

I don’t know, I never asked my mother that. Does mental illness run in your family, does it in anybody’s? I would have liked to have more of my mother in the movie, but a movie is an impression of a life.

Were you ever prescribed (psychiatric) drugs during your time at V.A. hospitals, or otherwise?

I was very stubborn. I grew up at a time where you didn’t do that. You didn’t take those things. You would never admit a problem, especially caused by a war.

What do you think of today’s campus unrest?

I am very inspired by the young people. I was absolutely outraged at what Hamas did to the Israeli people. It was unforgivable, and they must be held accountable. At the same time, Israel’s response to that terrible day has been outrageous.

If I would speak to the (young protesters) I would say how proud I am of them, but to always seek the moral high ground. March in the spirit of King, in the spirit of Ghandi.

The war has got to stop now. As empathetic as I am to Israeli families, Netanyahu and his government’s response is way over the top. And the bombs are coming from us… We get involved in far too many conflicts… If I were to speak, I would talk about divestment, they should talk about (defense contractors).  Are these American cluster bombs being used? What weapons are from which companies…?

What do you think of the 2024 presidential campaign?

I can’t support either one. For Biden, the war in Ukraine, and support for Israel, and (sending) weapons. I don’t quite trust Donald Trump either. I met Joe Biden (at the 2014 Kennedy Center Honors for Bruce Springsteen). I was very impressed with him, how gracious he was. It troubles me with the position he’s in with both wars…. It’s a very difficult moment. If Israel goes (further) into Rafah, I believe we’re going to see protests near the size of Vietnam. First, most importantly, I believe we’re going to move through this difficult historical period, and we’ll become a better country, a better people. I think this book is right on time. It’s coming out at the right moment. In good conscience, I can’t support either one of the presidential candidates. Both (would be) contributing weapons of war, bombs to both of these conflicts.

Were you opposed to more aid to Ukraine?

I don’t know the answer to that. Obviously they were aggressed upon, but when is it going to end? When will there be a peaceful, diplomatic solution?

Is the concern that if Putin takes Ukraine he won’t stop there, the return of “domino theory”?

It’s definitely possible, but domino theory in Southeast Asia never came true. …Whatever (Biden or Trump) do is up to them, I will oppose it. Have they lived with the effects of war everyday? Once they have, then they can tell me the righteousness of using violence to solve these problems. I’m proud of my service to my country, but I am just as proud of my (efforts) as a protester. In many ways what happened to me was a blessing in disguise, that I know what war does.

 

 

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In 2003, Kovic participated in a large protest march in London, just before the start of the Iraq War. He spoke to the “Occupy” Los Angeles gathering in 2011.

One of six siblings, Kovic’s youngest brother served in Kuwait in 1991, as a Navy Corpsman assigned to a Marine Corps combat unit. 

Ron Kovic has lived in Redondo Beach for the past 23 years, near his girlfriend of 18 years, TerriAnn Ferren.

“I’m one of the few paraplegics I know of to have lasted this long. With my time left, I want the days to count,” he said. “To not take secrets to the grave. I tried to tell people how I really felt. I do feel my life has been a blessing in disguise. I’m so grateful I’ve been able to reach millions of people, telling the truth about the effects of war. I had to give the complex, full picture. It’s really important, if I can contribute something, that I help heal this country.” 

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You wrote in the diary, soon after the shooting of Wilson, that you had decided to become a priest. Abandoning the idea after the war, you have come back to faith?

Yes. It’s a strong faith and a lasting faith, and it’s carried me through all these years. 

What was it like when the movie came out?

I got pulled over driving in Hermosa Beach; when the policeman asked for my license, he read my name and said. ‘I just saw your movie…’ I got a warning. That movie changed my life… I don’t know how I made it through those early years. But the movie, it just really lifted me up. It’s really like a dream, it was thrilling…. Co-writing the script [with Oliver Stone] … it was a very wonderful time. I thought it would be just a lot of tough years ahead. Every day, after the movie came out, I would get 70-80 calls, I had to take my phone off the hook at night. I found out then, that the black Marine [who carried him free of the combat zone], he had been killed that same day he saved my life.

Have you followed the 80th anniversary of D-Day?

Oh, absolutely. Very much, I feel for those young men who landed on Normandy. They had no idea what to expect… when you sign up, you’re owned by Uncle Sam, the military… Courage? Once you sign up with the military, you’ve got to do what they say. They were ordered to go onto those Higgins boats. You’re not going to say no, otherwise you’ll get thrown into the brig on the ship, or sent to jail. (Nonetheless), unbelievable, the courage at Omaha Beach, especially, they were in fact brave beyond brave.

What is the significance of the title, “A Dangerous Country: An American Elegy?”

Elegy: a sorrowful lament for what was. Our country would never be the same after the Vietnam War made us doubt our own government…

The epiphany you write about in the book, has it remained?

I came back through the fountain (near the Long Beach V.A. Hospital, where he had gone after the phone call) and something profoundly changed. It was delayed depression, after the traumas of the war. That night I felt this profound sense of forgiveness… It (all) dissipated that one day. I wondered that night if it would last, but the next day, and the next day, that darkness, it has never come back since. ER

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