The Road To Serenity

Written by: Ruby Alexandra Beloz

Written by Ruby Alexandra Beloz

In loving memory of my father

Rosendo Felipe Beloz

I dedicate this book to

My Mother

Brothers

Sister

And

Lorie Kligerman and BamBamm

In loving memory of my

My Brother Russell

Acknowledgments

Lorie Mae Kligerman

Editor

Vernon Kapala MSG US Army (Ret.) Editor

Linda Triol

Editor

Mike Subritzky

Final-Editor

International War Veteran Poetry Archives

Anthony W. Pahl

Supporter

Faye Sizmore

Supporter

Woodfork: Thurman P.

Supporter

International War Veterans Poetry Archives

http://www.iwvpa.net

My Dad Is A Vet

http://www.mydadisavet.com

Table of Contents

Korea

Is The Conflict Really Over

You're In The Army Now 3

Fort Campbell (Jump School)

Japan Operation Clean Up 5

Rakkasans 187th Airborne Korea

War Hero

Retreat! Run like hell

Paratrooper Rudy

Is the War really over?

Not worth twenty cents

Korea

The Korean War, originated on June 25, 1950 and a cease-fire was ordered on July 27, 1953. It started when North Korea invaded South Korea. North Korea was a communist nation and President Harry Truman got the support of the United Nations to stop the spread of communism in Asia.

The main supporters of the North Korean communists were the People's Republic of China as well as the Soviet combat advisors and their military pilots.

Even though South Korea had an army, the Republic of Korea (ROK) was mainly supported by United Nations (UN). There were many other nations that also contributed their soldiers, their per-sonnel and their dead! Below is a list of countries in acknowledge-ment of their service in the Korean War. In the USA, the Korean War is better known as:

•

Police Action

•

Korean Conflict

•

The Forgotten War

In North Korea, it was called the Fatherland Liberation War.

United Nation Countries that participated in the Korean War

South Korea

USA

Turkey

Australia

Canada

France

Greece

Thailand

Holland

Columbia

Ethiopia

Philippines

Belgium/Luxe

New Zealand

South Africa

Is The Conflict Really Over

So, you’re wondering why the history lesson? Well let’s just say that it’s important to me, that whoever picks up this book and actually reads it would at least have some general knowledge about the Korean War. Hopefully not too much information -where your immediate reaction would be to toss my book in the trash!

Thanks to the internet, I was able to collect some interesting bits and pieces of information for my book. Here are some hardcore facts.

Fact number one. I was told early on in life that if you add a value to something, it would grab people’s attention instantaneously. How about these numbers?

Counting civilians and combatants from intervening nations, more than Two Million people were killed in the Korean War. Guess what… nobody won the war and there were no victory parades.

Now do I have your attention?

I can see now why they refer to the Korean Conflict as the “Forgot-ten War” Who the hell wants to remember a war that was not popular or victorious?

Korea was a war where nobody won on either side. Do you think Hollywood would have cast John Wayne to sign up for that leading role? I don’t think so. In fact, I can’t ever remember him (JW) ever playing a role that he didn’t come out a winner or the hero or win the leading lady. Hollywood only portrays heroes and no one wants to pay to see a losing war!

Although John Wayne never served in combat in any war because of an old football injury, he did spend most of his film career sup-porting our troops in USO service organizations in Korea and Vietnam.

I can see now why Korea was not going to be JW’s next best selling movie. But hey, that was a different war and another book all by itself.

The Korean Conflict went on the shelf and collected dust for the next fifty years. They thought we would all forget the conflict and the Forgotten War would just go away.

My father came home diagnosed with “shell-shock”. That’s what they called it back then. There was no treatment for it except for prescribing heavy duty psychiatric drugs like Thorzine and Mella-ril. The drugs that are used for acute schizophrenia.

Today we know it as Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) Dad suffered from it all his life. I can confirm that neither he nor his family have ever forgotten the “Forgotten War”. In fact, we all became prisoners of war and life long casualties of my father’s PTSD and “The Forgotten War.”

The following stories were told to me by my father when I was young. I have no proof that they actually happened and I am not sure what order they are in. They were just stories that Dad hung onto until he died.

You're In The Army Now

My Dad was born on April 29th 1930 in Dearborn, Michigan. His father worked for the Railroad back in those days. Dad was born into a family that was a tragedy from the start. His was an un-wanted birth.

My Dad’s father was abusive to his family. He was a womanizing 24/7 drunken Alcoholic who would brutally and savagely beat his wife (my grandmother), his children and anyone that got in his way.

My father came home from school one day and walked into his mother’s bedroom only to find that she had committed suicide by hanging. My grandmother could no longer endure or take the vicious beatings from her drunken unfaithful husband.

Suicide seemed to be her only option and joining the army was my Dad’s last option- a different type of suicide by slow death.

His father respected no- one and was incapable of expressing any human emotions. His wife and children all feared and hated him. When he walked in the door even the dog would run and hide. He was drunk most of his life and died a very lonely man.

My Dad was always tall for his age and could easily pass for eighteen at the age of fourteen. After he left home he worked doing errands, picking fruit, performing odd jobs and anything else he could do to survive on his own. He did this until he turned sixteen.

He found a job in a small barber shop, the type with store front windows over-looking Main Street. The shop had benches out front with two candy canes spinning tube pillars, which were side by side supporting the entrance to the shop.

His job would be to prepare the lather and steam the towels for the barbers when they shaved the customers with a straight edge razor blade. Extra money could be earned by shining shoes. In those days men went to barber shops as a means to relax and exchange war stories with each other.

Dad would sweep the floor and keep the shop clean in exchange for a storage room where the Barber put up a cot for Dad to sleep. In the barber shop, he would spend days just listening to the patrons telling stories.

These were veterans now home from fighting in Germany and the South Pacific. He would overhear the men swapping stories of their exploits overseas in the war, friendship and the loss of their brothers. Brothers not related by blood, but related by a code of honor known only to them. The stories of war and adven-ture always intrigued my father.

They seemed so courageous to him, and reminded him of those Hollywood movies that John Wayne made. The men in those movies always wore fancy uniforms with shining medals and a rainbow of ribbons that spread across their chests dis-playing a soldier’s silent pride.

My Dad knew what it would mean wearing a military uniform; it would bring him instant respect. He would now be placed in a category that servicemen like him have earned. He would gain the respect that would ensure him the approval he so craved. The recognition given to men who had served in combat, and the chance of earning the Combat Infantry Badge (CIB), given only to fighting men, who had served at the very sharp end of combat. Both (the uniform and the CIB), acted as pow-erful incentives to my Dad.

They say a Veteran can always spot another Veteran from a mile away, just by looking into their eyes. They call it the thou-sand mile stare.

My Dad was just a kid (sixteen years old) when he signed up for the United States Army. But it wasn’t enough to just be in the Army, so he signed up to become a paratrooper. Since joining up to jump was voluntary, a paratrooper could earn an extra $50 a month (Hazardous Duty Pay).

Add that to his regular salary of $50 a month and he was earn-ing a whopping salary of $100 per month, less taxes, social security and laundry bill. For someone who scraped to get by, it was an impressive amount. Your benefits included chow, clothing and travel. Travel benefits to exotic places will be ex-plained later.

According to Dad, only real men jumped out of airplanes. Only real crazy men exit a perfectly good airplane in flight! He used to say that you have to have balls of steel or some serious loose nuts and bolts upstairs to jump out of plane deep into enemy territory at maybe 300 to 500 feet altitude. Training jumps are usually made at 1200 feet altitude to allow time to activate your reserve parachute if it’s needed.

No one was going to question him about his age because the Army needed replacements. The World War II vets had come home and were being discharged, creating a shortage in the military.

We had occupation forces in Asia and Europe to maintain. It was all the same to the Army recruiters. A little fudging here and there, sixteen or eighteen; it was close enough. Dad had no-where to go, nor anyone who loved him, or wanted him.

It was now winter and there were no jobs picking fruit, so he went to an Army Recruiting Office in San Francisco, where he would meet a Recruiting Sergeant that felt sorry for him, and let him sign up at the age of sixteen.

I expect that the Recruiting Sergeant was trying to reach to his "recruiting goal" for the month. The Sergeant told my Dad that the Army was now his new mother and father. The Army was now his family and would give him new brothers.

The Recruiting Sergeant told my Dad that in the Army he would never go hungry again. He would get three hots and a cot and be clothed with an Army issued uniform. Only this uniform looked nothing like the ones in the movies. There was nothing glamor-ous about Army issued fatigues and combat boots.

The jump boots he would buy for himself was what would distin-guish him from the other soldiers. They would be Dad’s pride and joy throughout his military career.

Fort Campbell (Jump School)

Dad was sent to Fort Campbell Kentucky in 1948 to report for jump school. I’m not sure of the dates but it was as close as I could come to. There he would be trained to become a Para-trooper. This now meant he would be in training to be one of the Army’s elite soldiers. He would become a Sky-Soldier.

Every Paratrooper that trained at Fort Campbell worked for one goal; to earn their Paratrooper, or Glider Wings. My Dad was proud that he had earned both of them.

Fort Campbell is where my Dad would make a lot of new friends from all different walks of life. Back in those days, the military was pretty much segregated in silence between the whites and blacks. Both races knew their places and the racial tension was already high enough. If there is one thing for sure, it is that whites and blacks just didn't mix in the South...and they liked it that way just fine.

But what the hell do you do if you’re a Mexican or an American Indian? You stay the hell out of their way. Once the training was over, the men would be sent overseas. In combat there was no segregation, and on the battlefield there was only one color - Army Green.

They knew they were going to need each other now more than ever.

Japan Operation Clean Up

World War II ended with the surrender of Japan in 1945 after the atomic bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. The 11th Airborne Division paratroopers were the first soldiers to enter Japan.

Dad was sent over with the 11th Airborne Division to Japan for the next two years doing occupation duty in northern Japan. His unit was stationed at Camp Crawford. In 1949 the 11th Airborne Division was ordered back to the States. Harry Truman was the President.

The President of the United States of America had just dropped another bomb. One that would keep all service personnel from coming home, even if their enlistment time was up. The Soviet Union was blockading Berlin. There was a shortage of military personnel in the services so hard choices had to be made.

President Truman cancelled all returns to the states and ex-tended military tours for all an additional year. This action caused many hardships to family with sons and husbands overseas, and much bitterness in the ranks.

Dad was given a “Truman” year extension that turned into two years.

My Dad was not a happy camper. He along with other Soldiers hated Truman and he often referred to him as a “Stupid son of a bitch.” Dad was not one to mince words.

Rakkasans 187th Airborne Korea

Dad’s unit was now (1950) designated as the 187th Regimental Combat Team (RCT). His unit was shipped out to Korea shortly after the war broke out from Fort Campbell. My father was assigned to Company C, 1st platoon. He made two major combat jumps while in Korea with the 187th Regimental Combat Team (Airborne) during the Korean War. The first was made on 20 October 1950 at Sunchon and at Sukchon, North Korea. The second jump was made on Good Friday 23 March, 1951 at Munsan-ni, South Korea.

My Dad made both of these jumps earning him “The right of the line.” He now had 2 bronze stars to add to his parachute wings, a sign of great respect from fellow paratroopers.

The word Rakkasan in Japanese means “Umbrella in the sky” The above is of the 187th RTC in Korea shortly after the Munson Ni drop

War Hero

My father was far from being a war hero. I remember once as a young girl I asked him if he was a hero and my Dad got really quiet. When he finally replied to me, it was with such sadness that his eyes got glassy. He almost started to tear up when he simply said “No, I’m no war hero. All the real heroes lost their lives during the war. I’m no hero. I was a survivor.”

I think my Dad was wrong. To me he was a hero. He went on to survive the coldest Korean winter ever, suffering from frost bite in both his feet in 30 degree below freezing temperatures and sleep-ing out in the snow when time was available for that luxury. He went hungry for days when they were stuck on a hill in mountain-ous terrain without food and were running out of ammunition.

He filled his canteen with rice paddy water which is pretty nasty stuff even with water purification tablets. Chow came from a tin can when it was available. Watching your buddies get “hit” takes a terrible toll, wondering if they are going to make it out of there alive in time to reach an aid station. Taking orders to accomplish what seems impossible and giving it your best shot. Yes, my Dad was a twice decorated Hero.

Retreat! Run like hell

My Dad told me this story about when the Chinese were over-running them by the thousands. He said that the earth started to shake and there was a sound like roaring thunder. The smell of burnt propellant, cordite, gunpowder and other munitions hung thickly in the air, and there was a huge dust cloud in the sky that was so thick you couldn't see in front of you.

Artillery shells and mortars were firing, incoming and outgoing. There were thousands of Chinese Soldiers that covered the hill like ants!

Dad said they were ordered into a full retreat. There were just way too many of them. All the Soldiers dropped their backpacks and anything that would weigh them down and they all began running down the hill for their lives. Dad also dropped his backpack, started to run, when he heard a fellow Soldier screaming. The man had gotten both his legs shot up and he couldn’t walk or run, so the man was crawling to get away.

His screams become ear piercing and my Dad couldn’t take it any longer; there was no way he would leave a fellow Trooper behind.

So he went back for him. Now facing the Chinese head on, dodging their bullets, he threw the man over his shoulders. Dad became a praying man right there and then. He started to pray in Spanish to the Virgin of Guadalupe (Mexico’s version of the Catholic Virgin Mary). He repeated the prayer over and over again- “Hail Mary full of grace the Lord is with thee.”

By the time Dad got down the hill the Paratrooper was dead. Dad never claimed to be a war hero; he just did what any Rakkasan would have done.

He never bragged about it. In fact he rarely talked of the Korean War except to me...and only because I was always asking him about it, and he regarded me as a confident.

All veterans that serve our country in combat are war heroes. It is that simple to me.

Paratrooper Rudy

My Dad had a best friend whose name was Rudy. They had both graduated from jump school together at Fort Campbell and later on were shipped off to Korea with the 187th RCT, Company “C.”

Rudy died in my father’s arms after being blown up by a grenade. My dad told the story to my mother at the kitchen table. He was drunk again as he would be for many more nights to come.

He was crying which was something I was not used to seeing. After all, my Dad was supposed to be strong and real men didn’t cry. John Wayne would never cry.

I was just a little girl but sensed my father’s grieving and deep sadness for his friend. At that moment, even though I was just a kid I knew my dad was never going to forget Rudy. For Rudy was going to haunt my dad for the rest of his life.

Dad proceeded to tell my Mother the story of Rudy being shred-ded by a hand grenade; literally blown to pieces.

He told her how he had pieces of Rudy's flesh stuck to his shirt while he frantically tried to collect Rudy's organs and put them back into his body. Then my Father started to cry uncontrollably.

"There was nothing I could do to make him STOP bleeding or to save him," he said.

My mother prayed the rosary for Rudy and my Dad. What else could she do?

My Dad was never going to get over the horror that happened to him (and to Rudy), during the Korean War. Today Post Trau-matic Stress Disorder is known to go "Hand in Glove" with a Tour of Duty in a Combat Zone, but back then there was only the "all encompassing" phrase of Shell Shock.

Is the War really over?

Dad thought that if he got married he would rid himself of the ghosts and demons that would later take him to the gates of insan-ity, Alcoholism or ending up in Ward 206D.

He picked the “The City of Angels” to raise his new family. He thought it would provide him with a safe haven to live out the American dream promised to him.

Every American GI that came home from overseas, and made it back home safely, wanted to buy a home with that GI bill passed by Congress. Or else, go to college, get married, and raise a family. It was a benefit that was guaranteed to them for fighting, killing and dying. Was it worth it?

Our family was shattered by mental illness (PTSD) and alcoholism. After all, American dreams are supposed to have happy endings. We lived close to Hollywood so there has to be a happy ending somewhere.

My father told me years later that real men didn’t talk about what happened to them in combat and that real men don’t cry. They hid the ugliness of war deep inside in a place that they can’t even find.

Almost twenty years would go by before my dad was going to get help with his untreated Shell-Shock (PTSD). He had good stretches where he could keep it all together and he had some bad ones as well. Dad hid his PTSD behind a bottle of whiskey.

One day Dad came home really drunk and was in what they called an alcoholic blackout. There was a brand new yellow Chevy Impala parked in front of our house. Dad picked up the fire poker from the fireplace and went outside and started beating on the new car in his mind he thought it was Chinese tank.

The vehicle owner came running out from an apartment building. At first he was going to kick my Dad’s ass, but then he just started talking to him and asking him where he served. My dad replied, “Korea” 187th Airborne, Private First Class (PFC) Beloz.” It turned out that this man had just come home from Vietnam and he recog-nized that my dad was having a flashback from Korea.

It wasn’t too long before the man who owned the car got Dad calmed down. They both were sitting on the curb of the street. The Vietnam veteran put his arm around my dad as he cried.

The man then called the police, but instead of sending my dad to jail, they took my dad to the VA hospital in Westwood, Los Angeles. That night the City of Angels sent my family an Angel.

The War for my father was finally over. There was a now diagnosis for what was wrong with my father, it now had a real name:

POST TRAUMATIC STRESS DISORDER (PTSD).

My father was to spend almost two years locked up in a psychiatric ward (Ward 206D). The doctors put him on the heavy duty psychi-atric drugs that they use for acute schizophrenia and gave him intense therapy. He finally got the treatment he needed. Unfortu-nately, it took another War (Vietnam) and twenty more years before he could get help.

My father never recovered from PTSD nor did our family recover from Korea. The Soldiers of the Korean Conflict lived by a code of silence. It was that silence that destroyed our family and broke my mother’s heart.

I spent almost two years visiting my Dad at the VA hospital in Westwood Los Angeles. Both my mother and I would take that long bus ride down Wilshire Boulevard.

We never gave up hope that one day he would come home.

My Dad lived in total darkness in a place deeply buried within his soul. Locked into the coldness of his dark Latin eyes was that 1,000 yard stare that always took him back to KOREA.

My father was finally released from Ward 206D and returned home to his family; however Dad never came back from the dark place in his mind.

Our government finally gave my, Dad some help. They gave him the title 100% disabled veteran and disability check until he died. Dad never recovered and died of terminal lung cancer in the VA hospital on October 12th, 1994. The night my Dad died I was not with my mother. I was home when I got the phone call. It was my mother. She said “Ruby its mom, get to the hospital. Your father died” I got in my car and I must have driven a hundred miles per hour on the 405 freeway!

Not worth twenty Cents

I found my mother once again praying the Rosary for my father for the last time. She told me that she had no change in her purse. She said it was late at night and nothing was open to get change.

I didn’t understand why she wanted change so I asked her “Mom, what do you need the change for?” She replied “to call you”. The nurse had told her she could not let her use the phone to call. The nurse said she had to use the payphone because the VA hospital did not let anyone use the phone!

I couldn’t believe what I was hearing or what she was telling me. She said she just walked the corridors of the VA hospital trying to find someone that would break a dollar bill for some change to call her children and tell them that their father died. This woman had just lost her husband.

A security guard found my mom and asked her if she was ok. She told him that the nurse at the nurse’s station would not let her use the phone to call her children that their father had just passed away. The man took her to a payphone and gave her change. He stayed with her until she called all five of her children. That night the City of Angels gave us another angel.

My father was a highly decorated Veteran that served his country faithfully in Japan, and also in Korea. Our family had sacrificed so much, and yet in the end his life was not worth two dimes for a phone call.

When my mom finished telling me what happened, I went to the nurse’s station where the nurse was standing. I told her that I understood that she was not from our country, but that the man lying dead there was a Veteran that served his country in two wars. He was my father and she should have shown my mother the respect our family deserved. The woman was clueless. At that moment I wanted to slap her, but I realized my mother needed me.

My father was buried with full military honors at the Riverside National Cemetery in California. I remember that my Dad used to tell my mother that when he died they would give her an Ameri-can flag. It would be her only inheritance.

Finally my Dad would have peace. He would take Japan and Korea with him to his grave. What my father loved was being an American and he loved being our father. I can say this about him...he was a "so-so" husband, but the greatest Dad a kid could have had growing up.

Each one of us kids has had to find our own recovery for our own PTSD. All of us live with our own nightmares, and each one of us had our own dark place where we would go to...except there were no bombs, bullets, or death. Just the memories of a father who could not tell us what was wrong with him. Our shame became our silent pain.

We all suffered flashbacks of a man who went insane because our government did nothing to help him, or the other men return-ing from war to fit back into society. As kids we would never invite our friends to our home for fear of what our father's mood would bring.

We lived with our secrets, our demons, and our silence was our pain. We never got to have father that did things like other father's did with their kids. We realized at a young age that our Dad was a sick man his PTSD, and with his cancer. The Korean War has ended for my Dad now, but not for us that are left behind...We are now the survivors.

About the Author

Hello, my name is Ruby Alexandra Beloz. I am my father’s oldest daughter of five children. I will no longer remain silent. I wrote this story to end my father’s silence and my family’s silence.

I have found peace in meeting the families of Veterans. We are families that share each others stories and it has brought us some comfort and peace knowing we are not alone.

I started to write poetry about the stories of soldiers and the shat-tered lives of families just like mine. There are families all over the USA that will never be the same. I have written about the ghosts in the Wall, the brotherhood of real men and the brave women that served too (Nurses) The women who stood silently by their sides as life slipped away. I write about their pain. I write about their stories I write for our Freedom!

I have found “The Road To Serenity.”