Richard A. Bammert

Richard Bammert was born in December 1946 in Englewood, New Jersey. His mother’s three brothers served in World War II in Europe. Two of Bammert’s uncles were wounded in the Battle of the Bulge. His third uncle, Cliffy, was in a Non-Divisional Field Artillery Battalion. In the 1990s, Cliffy got a letter notifying him that he had been awarded the Silver Star for his actions at Bastogne.

Bammert graduated from high school in 1964 and enlisted in the army on September 23 of that year. He took an aptitude test and was told that he should be in the electronics field. Bammert went through basic training at Fort Dix, then went to Fort Gordon, Georgia to Signal Corps School, where he was trained in Field Radio Repair. Bammert recalled that the transition from civilian to military life “didn’t bother me at all.” After finishing his course at Fort Gordon, he was sent to South Korea. Interestingly, although racial segregation had ended in the army, both White and Black soldiers had to travel separately because segregation was still enforced in Georgia.

Bammert was trained on the then new AN/VRC12 radios at Fort Gordon, but World War II-era radios were still in use in Korea, so his training was not as useful. In Korea at the time of his arrival, the only paved roads were in the capital, Seoul. He described his tour of duty in the country as “a strange situation.” The threat of North Korean infiltrators coming across the Demilitarized Zone (DMZ} was constant. Infiltrators generally spoke good English and carried thousands of dollars in American money. Another threat was land mines, many of them left over from the Korean War. To prevent stepping on them, cleared paths were marked with engineer tape.

When Bammert flew back to the United States after thirteen months in Korea, he landed at Fort Lewis, Washington, and from there went to Oakland, California, where his brother lived. The first thing his brother told him was to take off his uniform, as there were protestors against the Vietnam War in the area, something that Bammert was surprised to hear. The year was 1966.

Bammert spent the last nine months of his service at Fort Monmouth, New Jersey and was discharged on September 22, 1967. A civilian again, he went to work for Bendix Aviation on the night shift from three PM to twelve AM and recalled that the “money was great.” Bendix hired a lot of veterans at the time. The government was offering a significant bonus to reenlist in the Army, so Bammert joined the New Jersey National Guard.

Bammert’s first impression of the New Jersey National Guard was that it was filled with draft dodgers! Some joined protest groups that burned uniforms in the armory parking lot, in an event known as the “Duffel Bag Drag.” The presence of these people hurt the Guard’s reputation. Morale was very low, and unit strength shrank to below fifty percent. During his first two summer camps, Bammert was astounded as two large trucks filled with beer arrived, to fuel nightly parties.

During his first year in the National Guard, Bammert volunteered as an assistant instructor and performed an extra three weeks of active duty. During the first years of the Reagan presidency, the National Guard was very underfunded and had to use leftover equipment, but Reagan eventually built the military back up.

Bammert started his National Guard career as a Rail Surveillance Radar Sergeant, then moved up and took over a scout platoon as platoon sergeant. The unit’s First Sergeant was transferred to Riverdale, so Bammert raised his hand to replace him and got the rank.

When a full-time position became available in the 104th Engineers, Bammert applied for it and was accepted. He was able to keep his rank as first sergeant; and, on weekends, he took engineering courses at Fort Belvoir, Virginia. Bammert worked full-time during the week, as the battalion Military Personnel Technician, where he performed office work, strength reporting, and qualification information.

Bammert vividly remembered “the day that changed the world,” September 11, 2001. When the first plane hit one of the towers, he had just finished physical therapy and returned to the armory to take a shower. The unit armorer told him and several other soldiers to turn on the television in the officer’s club. When they did, they saw the second plane hit live on the screen.

Bammert stated that “9/11 changed everything for the Guard,” because units were quickly assigned missions to guard the George Washington Bridge, Lincoln Tunnel, Newark Airport, and Penn Station in Newark. Rotations on these deployments lasted from three to five weeks, and participants were equipped with full combat gear and live ammunition. The mission went on for a year and a half. There were a few incidents where drivers almost hit the guards, and Bammert joked that “most of the morons were at the GW Bridge.”

In February 2004, the 50th Main Support Battalion, with Bammert as its command sergeant major, was activated for deployment to Iraq. The deployment cutoff age for the Guard was fifty-eight; Bammert was fifty-seven when he was mobilized, and in good physical shape. While he was in Kuwait, he turned fifty-eight, and joked, “nobody squealed on me that I turned fifty-eight.”

The unit was mobilized and trained at Fort Dix, where the Army Reserve ran most of the training. Bammert described “their instructors” as “terrible.” During weapons training, the Reserve battalion commander grabbed Bammert by the sleeve and told him to get to the machine gun range and stay there until the crews got qualified, which they failed to do.

The 50th Main Support Battalion was somewhat understrength, and so the National Guard Bureau mobilized individual companies and assigned them to the battalion. When the 50th deployed for Operation Iraqi Freedom III, it was at 110% strength and had 1,163 soldiers, the largest battalion-sized unit in the US Army at the time.

The Guardsmen flew to Kuwait, where they were issued heavy equipment and had another session of mandatory training. They then joined a “ground assault convoy” from Kuwait to Tikrit, Iraq, where the 42nd Division headquarters was. They covered 590 miles in three days.

Humvees had to be armored, and Bammert’s unit didn’t get professionally armored Humvees for almost four months. Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld announced that no one should go outside the wire at a camp unless they had properly armored vehicles. Initially the Guardsmen only had vehicles with “hillbilly armor.” When Bammert and his men arrived at Forward Operating Base Speicher, the 1st Infantry Division was there. Bammert made the rounds with his counterpart for two weeks to learn his duties. 

In 2005, Bammert was on a convoy, and an Iraqi taxicab pulled up alongside his Humvee and exploded, killing the gunner, and wounding another passenger, although Bammert was uninjured. An additional personal traumatic incident occurred when a friend of his was killed in action.

A critical difference between Iraq and Korea was that you didn’t get a chance to interface with Iraqi citizens because of the danger of getting killed. In Iraq, security details would check trucks by stopping them and making the driver open the back of the vehicle to show the cargo. The war took a toll on soldiers. Some witnessed scenes they weren’t prepared for. Some committed suicide, and others experienced PTSD. Bammert coped with what he saw by “trying to put it away,” and his wife also served as a support system, as he called her as often as he could.

In August of 2004, the state’s Command Sergeant Major, Adjutant General and Governor visited the New Jersey Guardsmen in Iraq. There were also a few USO shows that visited Bammert’s camp. At one show, Bammert remembered getting an autograph from Jessica Simpson. Another show brought athletes and a standup comedian.

One night, a convoy was overdue, so Bammert and his staff were looking at its tracker when they heard explosions in front of and behind the building. He ran to cover in the dark and hit a barrier with his right knee, flipped over, and was knocked unconscious. He also hurt his shoulder and knocked a finger out of its socket.

Bammert’s daughter had triplets in January 2005. Family Readiness Support facilitated his wife’s retirement with a pension, so she could assist their daughter. The Army would not let him go home on leave to see the triplets, so his wife fabricated wedding invitations announcing that his brother was getting married, and that he needed to go home to be at the wedding. Fortunately, his friend approved leave, and Bammert got to go home to see his infant grandchildren. He described returning to Iraq after coming home as “terrible,” and said, “If I had it to do it again, I wouldn’t have come home.”

Bammert came home for a final time sooner than expected, because the 82nd Airborne Division showed up early, hauling their duffel bags and individual weapons, and so the Guardsmen began the process of turning over equipment to the 82nd. A photo of Bammert and his battalion coming off a plane on their homecoming made the magazine Guardlife. While processing out at Fort Dix, he was sent to a medical holding company because of the injuries incurred during the rocket attack in Iraq. Bammert was classified as disabled at Walter Reed Army Medical Center, for his hearing, knee, hand, and shoulder. His hearing loss happened over a career involved with firearms, the biggest contributor to this condition having occurred from riding in Humvees and wearing defective earplugs while gunners fired a .50 caliber machine gun next to him.

On his return, Bammert had one year to go to retire from the National Guard; he retired from his full-time technician job in August 2006. On his retirement from the Guard in 2007, he had a retirement party where he was presented with the Legion of Merit, which had a note with the paperwork that said, “I remember you from that cesspool at Fort Dix.” It was signed by Lieutenant General Russel Honore. Honore, who Bammert recalled was “hell on wheels” oversaw the Katrina relief effort in New Orleans.

After the military, Bammert went to Sussex County Community College to attend a Life Skills Assessment program. He was issued hearing aids from the Veterans Administration, where he goes regularly for medical needs and pays nothing. Bammert praised the VA system, saying, “I like it. Personally, I think it’s a very good system”.

Among his other awards that Bammert received for his service were the Bronze Star, the Meritorious Service Medal, the Army Achievement Medal, Overseas Service Ribbon and the Global War on Terrorism Service Medal. A particularly memorable award at Teaneck Armory that he received was the Korean Defense Service Medal. Bammert said, “the place went nuts,” and “my wife was crying; I was crying,” because he had no idea he was getting that medal. He is a member of the American Legion and has been for 35 years. Richard Bammert served as an officer with the Enlisted Association of the National Guard of New Jersey.