MILQUEST TEN QUESTIONS - TWO HOURS tom “Sachem Two” sheehan ACCEPTS THE challenge

MILQUEST
TEN QUESTIONS - TWO HOURS
tom “Sachem Two” sheehan ACCEPTS THE challenge

1. If you could change one thing about U.S. foreign policy, what would it be?
Insure that any USA out-of-country military activity is supported by an equal coalition force from other countries if we are not at war with an enemy. 2. If you had all the money in the world at your disposal to use for improving one thing for military people, what would it be?
Insure that after their military service is over, veterans are not living on the street or forgotten in back wards of hospitals. 3. If you could take one person from any era, any country, into battle with you, who would he or she be?
Young Oak Kim, 100th Battalion, 442 Regimental Combat Team, WW II, and 1st Battalion, 31st Infantry Regiment, Korea, 1951-53. I carried a Walkie Talkie radio for him when he was S-3 directing the lead battalion in the battle of the Iron Triangle, across Lake Hwachon on rafts and dories with outboard motors, into or near the towns of Hwachon, Kumwha and Chorwon, June 1951 thereabouts. I can see him now, standing on the skyline, his helmet under his arm, fearless, dedicated, his hand held out to me for the radio mike. When he became battalion commander, morale soared.

4. Who is the military person you most respect?
Major Young Oak Kim, 1st Bn 31st Infantry Regiment, 7th Infantry Division, Korea

5. What is the most important thing civilians can do to support their troops?
Pay homage to the troops during their service and after completing it.

6. What do you most love about military life?
Having comrades who could be depended upon when it counted and made themselves known.

7. What is your military pet peeve?
As in any endeavor, finding someone in authority who slipped in through a crack.

8. What is the most important leadership principle?
Belief in the task at hand, which generates confidence in the ranks.

9. What or whom is your most frequent military ghost?
That comrade who bravely walked away from home and fell elsewhere, and the frailest imaginable soldier of all, frightened and glassy-eyed and knowing he is hapless, one foot onto the soil at D-Day or a statistical sandy beach of the South Pacific and going down, but not to be forgotten, not here. 10. What is your favorite project or organization that benefits military people and how can others contribute?
Any shelter of veterans group that gives hope and help to veterans cast to the streets after their service is completed.

Tom Sheehan served in the Army with the 31st Infantry Regiment in Korea, 1951-52. Tom has long been a Milspeak Memo Contributing Compiler and a Milspeak Writer mentor. Pirate met Tom through Press 53 books. Publisher Kevin Watson sent around a link to Tom’s poetry. Pirate fell in love with Tom’s work at first reading.

Tom now has 88 cowboy stories on Rope and Wire Magazine and we don’t know of anything like that on another site. He has told the editor he is striking for 100 pieces and even sent him the titles of 20 more coming when it was at 80, and have cut through it to 12 to go.

Believe it or not, Tom thinks “It is fun every day, wracking my brain to find a story that fits a title and so far he excitement continues. It’s like a race with myself. I love it dearly!!!”

Tom Sheehan’s books are Brief Cases, Short Spans, (Press 53) From the Quickening (Pocol Press) and Epic Cures (Press 53). His novels are Murder from the Forum, Death of a Lottery Foe, An Accountable Death, The Keating Script, and Death of the Final God. His work is currently in or coming in journals published everywhere. His work has been anthologized in Home of the Brave, Stories in Uniform (Press 53) and in Milspeak: Warriors, Veterans, Family, and Friends Writing the Military Experience (Press 53). Tom has fourteen Pushcart nominations, three Million Writers nominations, Noted Stories for 2007 and 2008, the Georges Simenon Award for fiction, a story in the Dzanc Best of the Web Anthology for 2009 and a nomination for Best of the Web 2010. He has published 13 books. He has hundreds of Internet and print magazine appearances, and has appeared in nine consecutive print issues of Ocean Magazine. He and a committee of friends have co-edited and issued two books on their hometown of Saugus, MA, sold 3600 to date of 4500 printed ( 842 total pages in the two books) with color sections, text, timelines, nostalgia and history, all proceeds for Saugus High School graduates via the John Burns Memorial Scholarship. Tom was recently nominated for a 2010 Pushcart Prize for his short story, “OH, THE WOUNDS HE WORE, DEATH HIS NEIGHBOR.”

A Few Organizations that help Homeless Vets

Wounded Warrior Project

Homeless Veterans Reintegration Project

National Coalition for Homeless Veterans

Maryland Center for Veterans Education and Training

An Oldtimer Speaks Out

“Shall we dance?”