Where were you ...

Mic Smith
The Post and Courier

WWII veteran George Cercopely poses in front of his wall with his WWII pictures and plaques from his day in the Navy during WWII in the South Pacific.

When the Japanese attacked Pearl Harbor in December 1941, launching America full throttle into World War II, 15-year-old Dick Whitaker listened to the news broadcast on the radio with his parents in New York.

On that day, he had no idea that the attack would lead him from his small, "one theater" town north of New York City to the invasion party that fought for 82 days on the Japanese island of Okinawa.

"I remember asking my father if he thought I would ever go into the service," Whitaker recalls of the day his family learned of the attack on Hawaii. "I remember he said, 'I hope not.' "

Some of America's wars, like World War II, had shocking catalysts such as Pearl Harbor. Others, like Vietnam, had soft starts as what began with military advisors snowballed into more than half a million troops fighting in the jungles of Southeast Asia.

For those who fight and those at home, there are clear and defining moments when a war begins. Some recall exactly where they were when the World Trade Center fell on Sept. 11, 2001, while others recall the moment a war became real for them.

George Cercopely, who fought in World War II as a young sailor, was on a ship in the middle of the Pacific when word reached him that the war had ended. A great relief swept over him and the other sailors.

Cercopely returned home to North Charleston, moved in with his parents near the entrance of the Charleston Naval Shipyard, and went to work as a mechanic at the shipyard with thousands of others.

Five years later, when the North Korean army marched into South Korea, Cercopely wondered if he might get called up again. He had put the war behind him, and planned to get married.

"I was confused at that time, and scared I might have to go back," he recalls. "My mother was kidding me and said, 'George, what if you have to go back?' I said, 'They would have to burn the Santee Swamp and sift the ashes to find my little behind.' "

Fortunately, his orders never came.

Unlike the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor that launched the United States into World War II, the Vietnam War had a gradual start under then President John F. Kennedy, who initially sent in military advisors.

The war widened in 1964 after Congress approved the Gulf of Tonkin Resolution — sparked by an attack on the USS Maddox by the North Vietnamese, followed two days later by a suspected attack on the Maddox and the USS Turner Joy — which gave then President Lyndon B. Johnson the power to resolve the conflict by any means necessary.

Retired Navy Capt. Jeff Biel was a student at the University of Notre Dame when the Vietnam War began.

Even as the war escalated, he said it was far removed from his world. "I was worrying about what the football team was going to do on Saturday and, to some extent, what I was going to do after college," Biel recalls. "It was kind of a distant thing."

For him, the war became tangible when he got called up for service two years later — "my patriotism was inspired by my draft notice" — which launched a distinguished career in the Navy.

When Saddam Hussein invaded Kuwait in 1990, war became real for another generation.

Air Force Capt. Wayne Capps was a high school student in Tennessee when the first Gulf War began. At school, students were monitoring the rise to war on class TVs.

"I remember getting home from wrestling practice. I was 16 years old, and I turned on the TV and suddenly we're at war," Capps recalls. "I had no idea what to think. I had never seen a war in my lifetime. I had no idea what it meant for me and the country. I remember thinking, 'Oh God, I turn 18 in two years. Will there be a draft?' "

Capps said he never guessed at the time that he would end up with a career in the military. He was later stationed in Saudi Arabia and Turkey, and has made several trips to Iraq with members of the media.

Air Force Chief Master Sgt. Ben Futrell can't really recall where he was when the current wars in Afghanistan and Iraq started.

For him, the start of both conflicts began on a Tuesday morning in September, when the World Trade Center fell. On that morning, he recalls, he was working on a C-17 cargo jet at the airbase when he walked inside and caught the news on television.

He returned to finish working on the plane with what he said was a great sense of urgency, knowing the mission ahead.

"When they attacked us on our soil, that was the defining moment for me that we were at war with an organized group that fought to destroy our way of life, disrupt our country and way of life. We won't tolerate that."

Reach James Scott at 745-5855 or jscott@postandcourier.com.