june 6, 1968: fort bragg, north carolina

One of the reasons that I let myself be drafted, and in retrospective it seems extremely naive, is that Bobby Kennedy was running for President, and I figured that he would be elected and end the Vietnam War quickly.  It was while I was in basic training that Senator Kennedy was assassinated.  Our platoon commander had this way of telling us that Bobby had died:  "Two down, one to go!" (meaning the Kennedy brothers).  Me, I was devastated, and I wonder to this day how history could have been different.  Of all of the assassinations of the '60s, this was the one I felt most deeply.