War Without Heroes Initiative

War Without Heroes Initiative Return to Viet Nam vindicates the timeless principles of peace and justice in the world by raising awareness of the selfless courage all Viet Nam War vets.

War dominated 30 years of Vietnam's history last century. The struggle that began with communists fighting French colonial power in the 1940’s did not end until they seized Saigon and control of the whole country in 1975. The period that Americans refer to as the "Vietnam War" – and the Vietnamese call the "American War" – was the US military intervention from 1965 to 1973. Communist forces based

in the north and led by the nationalist leader Ho Chi Minh defeated the French in 1954. Accords were negotiated that split the country into communist north and pro-American south, divided by a demilitarized zone (DMZ). Country-wide elections to decide a permanent solution were promised but never happened, and within five years the communists had launched a guerrilla war on the south. Hundreds of thousands of US soldiers were sent to help fight the communists in a costly and ultimately unsuccessful war which brought domestic civil unrest and international embarrassment. The US was driven by Cold War concerns about the spread of communism, particularly "domino theory" – the idea that if one Asian nation fell to the leftist ideology, others would quickly follow. The Vietnam War was protracted and bloody. The Hanoi government estimates that in 21 years of fighting, four million civilians were killed across North and South Vietnam, and 1.1 million communist fighters died. US figures covering the American phase record 200-250,000 South Vietnamese soldiers killed and 58,200 US soldiers dead or missing in action.

(APRIL 01, 2024) FOREVER IN OUR HEARTS: it’s with great sadness we learned the passing of Lou Conter, Last Survivor of U...
04/01/2024

(APRIL 01, 2024) FOREVER IN OUR HEARTS: it’s with great sadness we learned the passing of Lou Conter, Last Survivor of USS Arizona From Pearl Harbor Attack. He was 102.

Of the U.S. Navy warships lost or damaged during the Japanese surprise attack on Pearl Harbor, the hardest hit was by far the USS Arizona, which was struck by four armor-piercing bombs. One of those bombs blew up the ship’s magazine, causing an explosion which sank the Pennsylvania-class battleship and killed 1,177 sailors and Marines, hundreds of whom are still entombed there to this day.

Among the survivors of the explosion was 20-year-old Lou Conter, a quartermaster who was standing on the Arizona’s quarterdeck at 7:55 a.m. when the first wave of 138 Japanese airplanes launched their surprise assault. Conter not only survived the explosion of the ship’s magazine, but he survived the attack on Pearl Harbor and the rest of World War II.

Conter was born Sept. 13, 1921 in Ojibwa, Wisconsin, enlisting in the Navy when he turned 18 in 1939. After three months of boot camp in San Diego, he was sent to the USS Arizona as a regular deckhand on the forward port side of the ship. After making Seaman 2nd Class, he was transferred to the quartermaster division. The attack on Pearl Harbor occurred just over a year later.

After Pearl Harbor, Conter continued serving in the Navy after Pearl Harbor. He became a naval aviator, piloting PBY-1 Flying Boats for Patrol Bombing Squadron 11, a “Black Cat” unit, hunting Japanese submarines at night while painted black. He flew 200 missions in the Pacific Theater where he was shot down twice, both time rowing to safety aboard a raft. After the war, he joined the reserve and went home to California.

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