My Dog Tag

Today I was reminded of something that always comes as a little of a surprise. I am a vet, of the Korean War. I survived nearly four years on the fierce battlefields first on the frigid shores of Lake Geneva in New York and then later in warmer Illinois, California, Nebraska, and Okinawa -- the last-named nine years after the fact -- plus two boat rides across the Pacific and one side flight to Goose Bay, Labrador.

All this was at the generous and thoughtful though also whimsical behest of Uncle Sam. For instance, upon our graduation from tech school in Illinois, why did he send the top guy to quaint, beer-swilling, post-Nazi Germany and all the others to what was then the hellhole of Korea -- except me, the 2nd ranking? I was dispatched to the ever sunny, orange-blossom ambience of Long Beach, California.

But Uncle Sam was quite a guy, and he never gave me or anyone else the why and the wherefore of his decisions. Instead he was always silent and only communicated with us via an unending series of documents that are now faded and crumbling, called "Special Orders." I never had any trouble picking out my name instantly among the others on the lists, because next to mine would be affixed the notation "(N)". Usually I was alone or nearly so in receiving this special attention, because most of the other airmen had nothing next to their names. Instead they had been consigned to total ignominy by being referred to at the start only as a group brusquely designated "W, unless otherwise designated."

I have to confess that I always got a surreptitious kick out of being one of the favored "otherwise designated." (It might help you to know that this was only five years after Harry Truman had desegregated the armed forces.)

--Someone had spoken of a website where, to get in, it helped if you were a vet. Always interested in things where it could come in handy to be a vet -- it only happens every decade or so, I can tell you -- I thought that as proof the site would want to know my serial number.

On the off chance that I remembered it and so wouldn't have to look it up, I thought I'd try punching a button in my mind.

To my surprise, eight digits came singing out that sounded suspiciously like the right ones!

Just to check, I got out my magnifying glass and looked at my dog tag, which I keep on my key chain. In the 56 years since the Air Force issued it to me, the tiny, embossed letters and numbers have sunk deep into the metal, and they were hard to read even with the glass. But yep, there those same digits were, precisely right.

It was the rhythm, you know. Back when I had to recite my name, rank, and serial number every time I turned around, I took to saying that number in a certain rhythm, a bar of music on which the numbers were printed like notes on a stave, and I guess by so doing I permanently engraved them in my head.

But there's an advantage to that. Even at this late date I can never know when I'll be taken a prisoner of war, except that now I have no rank to tell the captors. Hopefully, however, I will always know my name.

I thought about that dog tag, wondering if modern ones are made the same way, and whether they still have that little notch in one end. Probably not many people know what that's for. If you are killed in battle, they can open your mouth and insert the dog tag between your upper and lower teeth, with the notch pushed between two of your front teeth. Then they can give your corpse a good hard kick under your chin, to shut your mouth and lock the tag in there. That way everyone will know who you were.

I always thought that was an exceptionally interesting and important thing to know.