As a Vietnam War Veteran, Allen Bartleman said he takes exception to the manner in which the Trump Administration is conflating the 250th anniversary of the United States Army and President Donald Trump’s birthday with a joint celebration involving a parade and fireworks display in the nation’s capital on June 14. In a show of protest, Bartleman intends to travel across the continent to be in Washington on the day of parade and make a show of disapproval.
When the portion of the parade intended to commemorate the president’s birthday, which falls on June 14, Bartleman said he will turn his back on the proceedings.
“I will make my protest peacefully and respectfully,” Bartleman said.
Trump and Bartleman are almost, but not quite contemporaries, born roughly a year apart. Both came of age as the war in Vietnam was gearing up.
Donald Trump, born on June 14, 1946, was subject to the Vietnam War draft, which required that able-bodied men between the ages of 18-26 had to serve in the military for 21 months. That requirement was subject to suspension, known as a deferment. Ultimately, Donald Trump avoided serving in the military altogether and he pointed avoided serving in the military during the Vietnam War because he obtained, while he was attending college until 1968 for college deferments. Upon his graduation, he obtained a medical deferment.
Bartleman is a United States Marine Corps Vietnam veteran.
He was born in San Francisco in 1947, a fifth generation Californian, maternally descended from Irish 49s who came to California as refugees in search of food, fortune and freedom.
Bartleman attended public and parochial schools in San Francisco until age 13 when his father, a former Marine, found employment with the Marine Corps Supply Center near Barstow in San Bernardino County. Allen graduated from Barstow High School in 1965 and attended Barstow Junior College before enlisting in the Marines in 1966. He trained as an artilleryman and volunteered to fight in Vietnam, where he was a gunner of an 8-inch self-propelled Howitzer in the demilitarized zone, known as the DMZ.
During the Tet Offensive waged by the North Vietnamese Army and the Viet Cong in January and February 1968, Bartleman’s battery – a tactical unit that employed artillery, mortars and rocket launchers – accounted for numerous enemy casualties while itself sustaining a single Marine injury.
At the siege of Khe Sahn on the DMZ 6,000 Marines including Bartleman’s battery repelled 100,000 troops commanded by North Vietnamese Army General Vo Nguyen Giap, who divided his remaining troops to a symbolic battle for the ancient capital of Hue. After weeks of fierce house-to-house combat, the 3rd Marine Division recaptured Hue. In that battle, 3,000 United State Marines defeated 30,000 enemy, killing an estimated 20,000.
President Lyndon B. Johnson awarded the 3rd Marine Division the Presidential Unit Citation, the unit equivalent of the Bronze Star for its members’ “extraordinary heroism.”
Bartleman came back to the United States in 1968 and was honorably discharged. He returned to Barstow and Barstow Junior College, where he organized a chapter of Vietnam Veterans Against The War and edited the campus newspaper.
Bartleman wrote a scathing editorial, criticizing the continuing waste of American lives in Vietnam. He was promptly suspended by Barstow Junior College. In time, he was reinstated as the Barstow College newspaper’s editor, but was saddled with pre-publication censorship by the college administration. Despite restrictions, Bartleman covered and photographed the 1968 Peace March in San Francisco for the campus newspaper.
Bartleman graduated from Cal State University San Bernardino in 1972 and Western State University Law School in Orange County in 1979. He practiced law in San Bernardino for 42 years with an emphasis on criminal defense and civil right before semi-retirement. He continues to advocate for civil rights and criminal justice.
At age 78, he plans to attend the combined 250th Anniversary of the U.S. Army and President Trump’s Birthday Parade in Washington, D.C. on June 14th.
He told the Sentinel he believes that his presence at the parade of American tanks and other armament “will serve as a peaceful and civil statement opposing a military parade rife with wasted tax dollars, abuse of the valuable military equipment paid for by taxpayers and possible fraud as a birthday present disguised as a tribute to our U.S. Army.”
Bartleman has a GoFundMe site – https://gofund.me/55c1f359 – to help finance his D.C. travel costs.