Many of Pitts' soldiers believed they would not have made it through the ordeal had it not been for the leadership of their CO.

Some volunteered to go to Vietnam. But many of the soldiers who went were drafted into the service, ineligible for a student deferment because they had never been to college. Twenty-year-old Mike ...

Starting in May 1970, Centre County native John Pressler served in a long-range armor reconnaissance unit in Vietnam ... and living on bases where enemy soldiers would sneak up to the perimeter ...