@Hoodat Yup!
Want to talk about screwed? The army de-activated the 11th Airborne division while I was in jump school,and renamed them the "1st Air Calvary Division". A new division needs new troops,so guess what happened to most of the guys in my jump school class.
That's right,they ended up getting assigned to the 1st Air Cav,and losing jump pay.
Not all of them. The army was also in the process of moving the 173rd Airborne from Okinawa to VN at the time,so a some of them went to the 173rd,but since the 173rd didn't make any formal parachute drops in the VN war,they didn't get jump pay. Most of them were on Okie for a few months before the unit transfered to SVN,and drew jump pay for that time,anyhow.
The SF guys on Okie in the 1st group really benefited,though. They got to move from Quonset huts into the practically brand new air-conditioned and heated barracks the 173rd had just vacated.
Jump Pay was a VERY big deal at the time. IIRC,a Private E-2 in the army at that time got paid something like $69 a MONTH,and jump pay added an additional $55 each month. Become a paratrooper as a Private,and you damn near doubled your monthly pay!
Me,and 3 other guys from that graduating jump school class were sent to SF at Bragg,and remained on jump status and got the extra pay. The other two guys volunteered for SF. I didn't,and served in two different SF Groups before volunteering. Even then I was tricked into volunteering by the Group SGM,SGM Dunnaway.
Serves me right. Anytime a PFC (for the 2nd or 3rd time!) thinks he has outsmarted a SGM,the only one he has outsmarted was himself. SOB tricked me into volunteering for SF duty,and put me on a A team to cross-train for an upcoming VN tdy assignment.
I should have been suspicious when I saw him smile,but was so cocky I just ignored it. That taught me a very valuable "life lesson".
