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9700-A Papa-Bear

Overview

See the films:

“Platoon”

“Full Metal Jacket”

11 Mar 96 ---
I obtained and viewed both films.
I also made a copy for later reference.

Find the PBS documentary on Vietnam.

Watch the film “Bat 21” with Tony and ask him what reality there is in it.

Name Tony Hasboun Born 1953, Aman Jordan

Wife Randa

Non Sean Born 16 Aug 95

Tape number Date recorded Disposition of tape

1 7 Mar 96 Transcribed and erased

2 7 Mar 96 Holding Start transcribing at start of tape

3 7 Mar 96 Holding

4 7 Mar 96 Holding

5 14 Mar 96 Holding

6 14 Mar 96 Holding

7 21 Mar 96 Holding 3 pistol shots

30 Mar 96 Holding 3 pistol shots Rescue Mark

8 30 Mar 96 Holding Rescue mark

At that time I was not aware of the government policy used to get rid of rife raff. Instead of putting them in jail, they put them in the military and sent them off to somewhere where they would very likely get killed. ~~If the situation didn’t kill them, then there were these unforeseen coincidences in which they just happened to have a fatal accident.~~ When I got on the list, the Vietnam war was in full swing, so you can quickly guess where I ended up.

Add the following two paragraphs to the query letter. In the book place them at the end of the theater incident

(The First Chapter was Originally written 12 Mar 96) Revised Thu May 28, 1998

There’s this funny thing about life. No matter what you believe, you’re right.

================

Fox holes my ass. Foxes are noted for being cleaver. This is a dumb-assed son of a bithch hole. Not only that, it’s got three inches of dirty smelly water in the bottom and I’m lying in it.

I'M sure that I too am a dead man. At the moment, I’ll swear on a stack of invisable bibles that if I survive this , I’ll ________

I can hear the screams of agony between the wistling of incoming mortar shells. that are landing all around me.

I’ve already ship my pants twice today, and now I’m shaking so that I can’t __________Another round strikes nearby and I”m again showered with dirt. this time the dirt is mixed with blood. A boot with a foot still in it falls on my head.

Suddenly silence reigns The moaning has stoped. A ray of sunshine breaks through the clouds and I ‘m transformed as if an angel had touched me.

I look down to the hole I used to be lying in. It’s empty. A body lays nearby as if heaped there by a mineature bull dozer. There is no movement in that body. Suddenly I am aware that I am standing up, but my feet are about three feet off the ground. I look at my self and at the body. That body is me. At least I used to identify with that body. OH.Shit! I’m dead.

But I can’t be dead because I’m still here. What ‘s happening to me?

==============

Radio operator Those fuckers are having a pissing contest and they want to use me to do their pissing.

Every time I look back on that day, I am amazed at the extent I put myself through for the lessons that I learned.

I don’t have to wallow in this swamp waiting to get my ass blown off. I can just stand up and get my head shot off.

And I thought I was such a wise son of a bitch.

SThe Real Karate Kid:

I’m only 5’4” tall and weigh only 125 pounds. At age 15, I was beat up by a big guy. I swore this would never happen again, so I studied and became a black belt in karate.

Notes on the death of his beloved:

I was an straight A student in high school.

I obtained a full scholarship to Stanford University, to study law.

On prom night May 1972 I gave a jeweled ring to my beloved, Janet and asked her to marry me.

That same evening, in parking garage, two black men accosted us and attempted to rob us.

I said, “No way! Over my dead body

She said just give them what they want.

She stepped between the robbers and me and the bullet meant for me killed her.

I went berserk! I grabbed the gun and killed the one who shot Janet.

I chased the other to the top of the building, beat him to a pulp and then threw him off the fucking roof.

His body landed on the hood of an arriving police car.

I am Jordanian. At that time being Jordanian was associated with Sirhan Sirhan the man who shot Robert Kennedy.

I could not afford a lawyer, so I had a public defender.

With something like that on my record, I could never get into law school.

The judge worked a deal with them (Who is them???) Here’s what they offered me.

If I enlists in the army, they will wipe this incident from my records. They will send me to Vietnam and when I return, I can still go to Stanford. I was scared so instead of pleading self defense, I took the deal.

As court proceedings were nearing completion, my draft number came up, so I didn’t have to enlist. It worked out perfect. I was drafted.

Military, The Basics:

Army: I went through four weeks of army boot camp.

Upon completion of army boot camp, They lined us all up and called out four of us and said, “You guys are now volunteers for the marines.”

They told us that they didn’t have enough volunteers for the marines so they were randomly selecting people out of the army to fill the vacancies. They said that the choices were random. I can’t prove that it was otherwise, but I don’t believe that for one minute.

Marines: They shipped us to Camp Pendelton. I was facing another six weeks of boot camp. Army boot camp wasn’t good enough for the Marines. I had to go through marine boot camp.

In army boot camp, I was always the wise guy and always got into trouble with my D. I. (drill instructor) I did the same thing in marine boot camp.

All the other guys were six feet tall or taller. I was the only one who was Five feet four. We arrive at Pendelton and step off the bus. The D. I. looks at me and says what are you doing here. You are not marine material. Being the wise guy I am, I said, “You know sergeant, your right, I’m not marine material. I turn around and I’m getting back on the bus. The D. I. garbs my by the collar, turns me around, lifts me completely off the ground and as he coldly stairs into my eyes, he says, Shit head! When I get through with you, you will be.”

With my cocky attitude, I’m always getting into trouble. The next six weeks are hell. I spend most of my time doing K. P.

As you probably know, the job of the D. I. is to do whatever he can to push the recruits to the maximum, to push them into loosing their cool. That was the marine’s way of toughening us up for what lay ahead in Vietnam.

When the D. I. found out I was from the Middle East, he started calling me Camel Dung”.

Mess with the horns:

As part of our training in self defense, the D. I. has each of us lunge at him with a bayonet. He knocks everyone down, takes the knife away and holds it at their throat.

When I see my turn comming I can hardly wait. This is my chance to get revenge --- sweet revenge. I’m about to climb ten feet up this mother fucker’s ass and (__________ ) The D. I. doesn’t know that I am a black belt in karate. I never told the army about this. I never registered with anyone.

I learned Karate, starting when I was 15. I got beat up by a big guy, so I decided to learn karate so no one would ever beat me up again. What karate taught me was not to be a bully or vengful, but to be more self confident. I learned the meditation practices, the relaxing and the actual physical movements. I learned how to do all three at once. Thus, I developed a strong sense of self conficence. Being a little guy no longer bothered me because I had self confidence.

So I watch him as a cat watches a mouse --- he’s mine and I know it. I watch the way he moves. When it’s my turn, I step up with a big smirk on my face. I say to myself, I’m going to teach this son of a bitch a lesson. The lesson I was going to learn from this incident did not come until much later.

I begin the lunge at him as he would expect me to do, but knowing exactly how he is going to respond, instatntly I side step him. I take him down extra hard so that he lands flat on his back, with me on his chest. The surprise, the shock of him hitting the ground and the weight of me on his chest knocks the wind out of him. With my bayonete slightly heavier than needs be against his throat, I look him straight in the eyes and, with a cross between anger and laughter, say, “You call me camel dung one more time and I’ll cut off you balls and sutff them down your throat.” There is nothing he can do. He just lays there. As I get off him, I intentionally make a slight cut on his throat with the tip of my bayonette, not enough to cause any serious physical problem, just enough to anchor home my verbal messege.

As he struggles to get up and regain his composure, I can see that he is visably shaken. Everyone is laughing except the D I. A slight trickle of blood is running down his neck. I try not to laugh, but of course, I have a big smirk on my face. I’ve just made a very big fool out of his ego.

Now that is an absolutely absurd thing to say and do to a D I who has the capacity to put you ass in a sling and hand it over hell’s hottest fire. However, my years of self discipline and training has risen my cocky self confidence to the point where I feel excitement where most people would feel fear.

It was not until after we graduated that I told him I was a black belt in Karate.

When you take someone’s self confidence away and there is nothing left.

During the entire boot camp, I never even entertained the idea of failure. THey were giving me all this shit and I was saying so what. I can handle it. Throw some more at me, I can do it. 200 push ups, no problem. I used to do 300 push ups in three minutes in high school. You want me to stand in the sun all day, I’ll stand in the sun all day. Everyone arround me collapsed and I’m still standing there until the end of the day.

(Tony is laughing while he is relating this part of the story.) I would not give him the satisfaction of breaking me. I was into the battle of wills. I was stubborn. Who is the strongest willed person? In the long run, I won. Some people don’t think so, but I look at it as winning, even though I went through what I went through. My inner being says “I won!” And in the mean time, it toughened me up. I came out of there one hell of a tough son of a bitch. When I walked out of there, anybody that tried to fucked with me was in deep shit.

All my class mates had very high respect for me. They just saw me stand there and take it, and take it, and not give up.

There mentality is to try to get you pissed off and lose your temper. They wil ldo anything they can to get you to lose your temper. I was calm cool and collecte through out the whole time. I always laughed and let nothing get to me. They would verbally degrade me attempting to get me pissed.

I had grey hair at the time. He would call me old, a worthless son of a bitch. They specialize in degrading the recrutes. They swore all the time. They even slapped me arround some. I got my face slapped on several occasions. If I hit him back, I’d be in deep shit, so the only thing I could do was stand there and take it.

A lot of the guys would break down and cry. We were 17 and 18 year old kids. Some opf them had never been away from their parents. This was one hell of a shock to them. I was like a big daddy becaus I was the oldest. I was 19. I was one year behind in school because my famioy moved around so much.

Early Childhood:

I was born in 1953 in Aman, Jordan, the capital of Jordan. My parents are Palintineans. I lived in Aman for a total of only five years, because my dad was in the diplomatic core and traveled all over the world. He was transfered about every two years or so. So I lived in Germany, Moraco, France, Italy, Spain, I came to America when I was 12 years old.

First three years in Aman, Jordan, then age ten and eleven back in Jordan. I learned to speak German, English, French, Spanish, Arabic, Italian,

I’ve completely forgotten German, and Italian. Spanish and french I can pick back up easily. I still speak arabic fluently but I never learned to read or write it.

In military boot camp:

I was constantly on his shit list. I would say things back to him in Arabic, and he would growl at me, “What did you say?” I would tell him I said something other than what I actually said. I explained the Arabic words to the other guys in the company, so they often knew what I had said. For example, I would say he a jack ass in Arabic, and all the guys would laugh, making him look like a fool.

I was constantly in trouble, but it toughened me up really good. I came out for the better. I was determined that no simple D. I. son of a bitch is going to break me.

I was constantly in trouble, but it toughend me up.

Some of the things we had to do were unbelievable. For example, I did KP duty all knight, cleaning dishes, pealing potatoes and then starting at 4:00 am in the morning, with no sleep at all, we would go on a 60 mile march with full pack, full gear on, that’s about 80 pounds. I was physically strong, but I weighed only 130 pounds. For someone weighing 220 pounds, which was about average 80 pounds is about 35% of their body weight. For me weighing 130 pounds, that ‘s about 61% of my body weight. That’s like the other guys carying 130 pounds of gear.

Another they made me do was go the the beach and double time in the water up to my knees for an hour or so with full gear on.

The DI was trying to get me to quit. He pushed others, but he pushed me the most because I was the wise guy. I could have quit any time, but I was determined that that son of a bitch would never break me. I was in the military as an alternative to going to jail, so I believed that if I quit, I probably would have gone to jail.

One of my bad habits is to have asmirk on my face. It’s just the way I am. People look at me and think, “What is he up to?” A lot of times I was up to something. A lot of times it was just there. I was always in a happy mood. I wouldn’t let anything get me down.

Nothing on the face of this Earth could be that bad for me to whipe that smirk off my face. I was always laughing and happy.

That smirk would regularly get to the DI. I’m standing at attention with a smirk on my face, and he would tell me to whipe that smirk off my face, and I litterally could not. It would get him really irritated.

And, of course, I was a good marksman. I beat his course. I hand to hand combat, he couldn’t even come close to me.

After camp pendleton, we got our assignments, a few of us were volunteered for what, at the time, was called special forces, or the green baret. I didn’t want to be in the green beret. Wht woul’d I want to be in the green beret for?

The more you hate me now, the more you are going to love me when you find your training here saves your ass.

Magical Coincidences:

There are numerous, seemingly almost-magical, and yet essential pieces to the puzzle of my life. I can no longer discount them as mere coincidences

At 11:30 pm on October 31, 1972, I parachuted into the North Vietnamese jungle. It was not until weeks later that it dawned on me that it was Halloween night that I dropped into this hell hole.

took him down and put the bayonet to his throat. I was on top of him with my cocky smile that says, “I got you.”

I told you --- you fuck with the horns you’re gona get scrapped.

D I’s don’t like that. Needless to say, that didn’t go over very well with him.

"T.L.C " P. O. Box 1934, Santa Monica, Calif. 90406

1030 "E" Street, Marysville, California 95901

310 / 453-3786

Last spell Check 19 Mar 96

Last saved as a copy

9700-A Papa-Bear Copy 1

9700-c Papa Bear Copy

Part c --

Transcribed Sun Jun 14, 1998

I traveled all over the world with my dad. He wanted to give us an education, which he could not do in Jordon, so hw wanted to come to the united States.

After 18 years of service in the Jordanian diplomantic corps, his visa came up with the opportunity to go to the U. S. He had to take it whrn it camr up or loose it. The opportunity wouyld not come again gor another visa for 8 to 10 years. In order to move to the U. S., he had to forgo his retirement pension with only two years to go. To my father, we were more important than his retirement fund, so he quit, he gave up the retirement benefits of 18 years of diplomatic Corps service and moved to the U. S. so that we, his sons could get an education.

Tony was brought up as Catholic in a counthry that is 90% Moslem and only 10% Christian. We have a very close family. We apprecite all the sacrafices that my mad made for his children. The Arabic family value that I was brought up with is to live for you children ---- to leave them with something better than you had. I attended Junior high school and high school here in the U. S. We went to paroprial school, even though it cost more money that public school.

I was 12 yers old when we arrived in the U. S. Because I am the eldest son, I had to shoulder part of the responsibility. I had to work with my dad at his store. He ran a 7/11 market, which meant it was open from 7 am to 11 pm. I would be at the store from after school till close at 11 pm. After a year, he bought his own market. I was still there with him from after school till close at 11 pm.

I went to school from 8:00 am to 3:30 pm did high school sports (cross country and track) and then went to the market until 11:00 pm. After a while it became obvious that he wasn’t making it financially at the market so I decided to go out and get a job elsewhere. I got a job at a gas station. I took the graveyard shift because it was perfect for me. I could work all night, go to school, do sports after school. I would get short sleep periods in the morning, afternoon, at school lunch breaks and sometines at work I could sleep becuse it was not very busy. I got used to an average of three to four hours of sleep a night.

I learned to be a menchanic. I picked it up very quickly. Soon I was making more money than I had ever seen before in my life. At age 16, (1969-- verify date) I was making 500 per week as a mechanic. I was helping to support the family and to send my sister to marymount college. I bought my own car. Because my dad could not afford to give us anything, I had to hustle for it and I did.

When I was 16, I decided I wanted to race cars on the racetrack. Because I was under age, I needed parental approval. My dad signed under the condition that I maintain high grades is school or he would withdraw permission for me to drive. I juggled racing into my schedule. I took the cars to the garage and fixed them at night. I raced for two years while I was in high school.

There were no financial backers. There was no return, because this was amature racing. I took the money our of my own pocket and it went into the cars. I ‘d put $2,000 into a car or an engine and and then wreck it on the track. I was in a lot of accidents but I also had a lot of fun. Even though tons of money went down the drain, I wouldn’t have done it any other way. I did it just for fun.

It just meant that I had to work harder because I wanted to play and also to support my family.

I’ve always been a good people person. I get along with people very well. People fall in love with me very easily. including customers. Customers would leave their cars with me over night. I would have 20 to 30 cars a night to do. It was just amazing. I was getting $1.25 per hour plus comission. How I made my money wasthe comission. I was honest. People trusted me. It worked out fine. I had a good attitude. I was friendly and cordial. I was also down to earth, yet confident in myself. I care about others, but I don’t care what they think of me. I know who I am and that is all I care about. People would have fun being around me.

One of the other things I liked to do alot in high school was drink. I could drink a lot and not get drunk. There was something bout my system that I could drink hard liquor and never ger drunk. I had a friend that was a giant. He weighed 250 275 pounds and could crush you easily with his arms. So for fun we would go to bars and start fights. I was only 16 or 17, but I always looked older tha I really was so I could get into the bars without being carded, and even if I was I had a fake I. D.

We would go in and one of us would have a few drinks while the other satyed sober. We would never drive while drunk so one of us would always stay sober becaus it is not fair for someone else to get hurt becaus of our stupidity. I would pick on the biggest person in the bar. (Tony is laughing while telling this part of the story.) I had incredible self confidence and I had my buddy backing me up. Amazingly, I never got caught by the police. I always escaped before the cops arrived. My buddy got caught once.

No knives, no guns, just a fist fight. We wouldgo to gay bars, to biker’s bars just to start problems. Some of the bars began to recognize us and wouldn’t let us in.

I’d got hit a few times. I got a couple of cracked ribs, but nothing really bad. I never gor really beat up bad. I was resiliant. I was very fast and I was in very good condition, and I had been studying karate since I ws age 15. I don’t break easy.

My high school years were the best years of my life. I got in lot of trouble and had lots of good times. I’d do it all over again and I wouldn’t do it any different.

Graduated high school at age 19.

Our attitude was that we had nothing better to do. It kept us sharp. It kept us on our toes. Starting fights was our way of having fun. It’s better than drugs. Its better thatn drinking and driving.

In 1968, I started high school. A couple of bulies started picking on me so I decided I was not going to put up with this bulshit. I lived in Torrance, California and went to Bishop Mongomery Catholic high school. Most people believed that if they sent their kids to Catholic high school they would be better behaved. That was not the case. I sa more sex and drugs than was in public schools. Probably because most to the kids were from the more wealthy families. The kids had the money and their parents didn’t have the time to spend with the kids.

Robert E. Z. Cote, M.S.

P. O. Box 1934, Santa Monica, California, U.S.A., 90406

310/453-3786

Last Spell revised Feb 98

Last saved as a copy Feb 98

9700-c Papa Bear Copy

Part c --