[Announcer] Funding for One Week In October provided by: the Virginia War Memorial Foundation.

[Narrator] October 1983.

The United States military found itself engaged in two very different military conflicts, resulting in two very different outcomes.

The first... in Beirut, Lebanon.

Multinational forces comprised of American, French, British, and Italian troops arrived in the region to act as peacekeeping forces between warring factions during a Lebanese Civil War that began eight years earlier.

The American contingent consisted of Marine Corps, Navy, and Army personnel.

24x7 combat and outdated rules of engagement left troops exposed to a number of threats.

On Sunday, October 23rd, a suicide truck bomb struck the barracks housing the 1st Battalion, 8th Marines of the 2nd Marine Division, marking the deadliest single-day death toll for United States Marine Corps since World War II.

It was an attack that no one could foresee, and untold devastation that few could ever imagine.

Two days after the tragedy in Beirut, a second conflict involving the US Military was underway more than 6,000 miles away on the island of Grenada in the Southern Caribbean.

Communist infiltration and a government coup meant the island was in chaos.

Caught in the middle of the conflict were Grenadian citizens, and hundreds of American students attending medical school at St. George's University.

President Ronald Reagan had concerns over the construction of a Cuban and Soviet-backed airstrip with international security implications.

He also feared for the lives of the American students.

Acting on an appeal for help by Eastern Caribbean countries, he ordered a military intervention, evacuation, and occupation.

Operation Urgent Fury launched in the early morning hours of October 25th.

One week, two conflicts... lives lost... heroes made... and countless lives forever changed.

These are just some of the stories as told by Virginia veterans... of their One Week in October.

[Jerry Walsh] The Marines were sent to Beirut and... as part of the peacekeeping presence mission.

And that was following the Israeli invasion of Lebanon on June 6th of 1982.

So we had the Israelis and the Christian Phalange on one side, and then you had the Syrians, the PLO, and the many Muslim militias on the other side.

[Michael Dick] It was perceived by many of the locals that the United States government had taken sides in the, what was essentially a Lebanese civil war.

And the government of Lebanon was, in many ways, in many areas, predominantly Christian, as opposed to Islamic or some of the other religions in the area.

And so, with the shift in that perception of who the United States was supporting, then the players there began to perceive the United States as an opponent to them, and acting against their interest.

As a consequence, it was felt by many of them that the United States had become a target.

[Jerry Walsh] So when we first got there at the end of May, beginning of June, we had sporadic incoming fire, everything from small arms to automatic weapons to mortars to rockets.

And I would say in mid-August on, we were in combat every day and every night.

The intensity of the combat most people don't know about.

So we were taking incoming at all levels from mid-August until we left on the 18th of November.

-That was very frustrating because all we kept doing was taking incoming fire.

And there's this famous sign, I'm sure it was in the periodicals, the "Can't Shoot Back Saloon."

It was one of the Marine positions out beyond the runway, east of the runway.

-So the rules of engagement were very simple.

We were not to engage any forces unless we were engaged by them.

We were to keep our magazines in our weapons.

No round in the chamber, and the weapon on safe.

Again, keep in mind that we were engaged in combat operations day and night.

What was interesting is the militias, the Amal, the Druze, the PSP, Progressive Socialist Party, the Syrians, the Iranians who had a military presence there, the Russians had a military presence there, so we were basically situated in a static position with a lot of people that don't like the United States firing whenever they wanted to into our position, in our defensive position.

[Anthony Pais] Marines are used to fire maneuver, not static positions.

So we weren't in the defense.

We weren't on the offense.

We were a presence mission, and we were peacekeepers.

[Walter Shumaker] So they weren't able to shoot back.

They weren't able to do what they were trained to do, you know, which is fight.

They weren't able to do that.

So while there were bombs being aimed at these guys, projectiles, whatever you want to call them, while there were bullets flying towards these guys, you know, it was a peacekeeping force, and there was nothing they could do about it.

You know, nothing at all.

[Jerry Walsh] So we were-- we were taking incoming the night of the 22nd into the morning of the 23rd, as we usually were in Beirut.

I was located on the southern perimeter of the airport, probably about 800 meters from the BLT headquarters across from the runway.

It was 6:22 in the morning.

I was just getting up from my cot inside a bunker, we all lived in bunkers by that point in time because of the consistent combat operations that we were undergoing in a defensive static position.

I went to sit up, I went to actually get up off my cot... [bomb explodes] And the concussion wave from the bombing 800 meters away knocked me back on my cot.

Seconds later, I heard shrapnel going through the leaves of the tree next to the bunker.

And we, at that point in time, had numerous car bombs going off in and around Beirut, so I knew exactly what it was at the time.

Above the airport administration buildings was a huge black mushroom cloud emanating from where the headquarters building was.

So, about an hour and a half past, my company commander and the company gunnery sergeant came back, they explained to me what happened.

The BLT headquarters was hit, numerous casualties.

-On Sunday morning, October 23rd, it was a cold day, and my dad and I had gone out to go get firewood to bring in.

And my neighbor yelled over and said, "Morning" and Dad replied, "Morning."

He said, "Did you hear what happened in Beirut?"

Dad looked and said, "No, what?"

He said, "They had some type of bombing over there.

Is Joe okay?"

Dad says, "I don't know.

We'll go check."

And then, we went in and turned on the TV and saw the buildings.

[Anthony Pais] It was early in the morning, right at dawn, just after dawn.

I was in my state room, right under the flight deck.

And I probably heard an APU fire up, and I heard some activity on the flight deck, chocks and chains being dragged around.

So I immediately got up, pulled on my flight suit... And we started the motors, ran the throttles up, and we loaded squad of personnel and medical personnel.

The urgency of the situation was, you know, it was unknown exactly what the situation was because no one could raise the 24 MAU on the radio from the ship.

We were about 25, 30 miles out.

You know, line-of-sight radio traffic on the UHF should be no problem.

All I could see and reported back to the FDO was a pillar of smoke.

I could not raise the MAU on the UHF.

I'll always remember was this eerie dead silence.

And the only the only noise, per se, was a generator that I think was the only source of electricity for the MAU headquarters.

I distinctly remember seeing shreds of towels, PT gear, mosquito netting.

You know, this is how Marines live.

I mean, you PT, you hang up your PT gear on your cot over your mosquito hat, and you have your gear.

That's just how you live when it's when it's hot.

And Marines, that's just, it was just those sorts of things that were just shredded and hanging in these trees that had been blasted.

I mean, literally blasted.

[Deanna Owens] So we still weren't sure exactly if that was the building that Joe was in, or if it was another building.

So we didn't really know what was going on.

But then as we started watching the news, the more we started to realize that it was the barracks the Marines were in.

[President Reagan] I know there are no words that can express our sorrow and grief for the loss of those splendid young men, and the injury to so many others.

I know there are no words also that can ease the burden of grief for the families of those young men.

Likewise, there are no words to properly express our outrage, and I think the outrage of all Americans.

[Anthony Pais] There was a triage effort going on initially.

They were triaging the Marines that were actually blown out of the barracks, suffered significant trauma, burns.

You know, of course, if you're going to be pushed out of a four-story building and you land on asphalt and concrete, that's-- that leads to significant mortal injury.

But they were the first Marines that medical personnel could get to.

[Phillip Jones] My job when I got off the helicopter was to support the Marines, but to go out and help dig into the concrete to find any remains or survivors.

And once we got off the helicopter, that's when I knew I was very much in a zone of combat because we started to hear small caliber rounds hitting the pavement.

[Jerry Walsh] We were receiving sniper fire at the site.

We were receiving incoming rocket and mortar fire, and small arms and heavy machine gun fire.

And that continued throughout the day during the rescue.

[Phillip Jones] T hat's when I started to not unravel, but more or less knew that I was in a place where I didn't want to be.

And that's when my heart started to beat really fast.

That's when I said to myself, I may not never come home.

[Jerry Walsh] Anyone who did survive the initial blast died or succumbed to their wounds at that point in time.

It was so difficult to get the cement, rebar, et cetera, off of them.

[Anthony Pais] It was an effort that we were using... initially you used your hands, for lack of anything else, or garden trowels or small e-tools.

The idea being that we didn't want to hurt anyone that was still in the rubble.

But it became apparent that the Marines that were still there were deceased.

The effort continued all day long, working the pile, the continual effort to make sure that Marines in the rubble were extracted.

And I don't know, within 48 hours or 24 hours, I believe, that the Marines that were alive had been pulled from the rubble.

[Jerry Walsh] There was a sense of shock, needless to say, to see the Marines that I had served with for the last few years, many of them dead, many of them in body parts, many of them still in the building, and we knew that they would not be coming out.

It was, it was tough, but we had a mission to do.

And of course, on that morning, 220 Marines, 18 sailors, and three soldiers were killed.

[Deanna Owens] It was on the fourth day in the morning, I heard my mom scream, and I looked out the window... and saw the chaplain, and we knew that Joe had passed.

[Phillip Jones] Mentally, I didn't have time to think, really.

It was just...

I was just in motion.

And, seeing that, it did devastate because I remember looking at other people's faces and, you know, it was... and one guy had to walk away because he couldn't stand it.

You know, that and the smell was very devastating.

But it affected me more after I got back to the ship because I was unable to lay in my bun and contemplate it, you know, that... that's when it started to really affect me.

[Walter Shumaker] I think, as far as the emotion, I think was a great mixture of both anger that this happened and the loss of life, man, was traumatic for everybody.

I mean, it opened a lot of eyes to what could happen, in a blink of an eye, even in what we were in, a multinational peacekeeping force.

There wasn't much peace, you know, and it was scary.

I think we were scared more than we were mad, but it was a large mixture of both.

I mean, it was just a loss that should have never happened.

[Jerry Walsh] Once I understood the reality of the situation where those that I served with were killed and wounded, it became a personal thing for us Marines.

Again, if we had the orders, we would have loved to go on the offense... but we did not, we were not given those orders.

Again, we were to be in a defensive, waiting for the fire to come in and not being able to do anything except hide in a hole undergrounds.

When we did have the opportunity, we were ferocious in returning fire and hitting our targets.

I think there was never a feeling of, "Oh, woe is me."

There was never a feeling of, "Come and get us out of here, we're scared."

There was never that feeling whatsoever.

[Ken Bagnasco] The lessons learned from Beirut, I guess, is preparedness.

All this terrorism was brand new, and I think back then, everybody thought, you know, all these peace missions we were on and everything was a piece of cake.

And it turned out we were basically going into, a country that everybody was attacking everybody.

They all hated everybody until we got there, and then they seemed to all hate us.

So we kind of walked into like a family feud.

[Keith Vida] So, to a certain extent, you kind of feel like, kind of maybe you should have picked up on the fact that this was something that could happen.

But back then, suicide bombings were relatively rare, and there had been a couple, but you really didn't think about that like you do today.

You know, you think about it and they haven't-- they didn't have the numbers like they've had today where people think about, okay, suicide bombing.

Back then, you didn't think about that.

That wasn't really how things were done.

[Narrator] The smoke had barely cleared in Beirut when just two days later, another major US military operation was underway halfway around the world in Grenada, the largest of several island countries of the Windward Islands in the Caribbean Sea.

While Grenada gained independence from the United Kingdom in 1974, a coup in 1979 by Revolutionaries with Marxist leanings resulted in the suspension of the island's constitution and the detention of numerous political prisoners.

By 1983, internal unrest within the party led to violent and deadly clashes, including the assassination of the country's popular prime minister, Maurice Bishop, and placing thousands of civilians in danger.

A covert plea for help by the island's Governor-General, Paul Scoon, and other Caribbean leaders, prompted President Reagan to launch a full-scale military operation.

The invasion was intended to not only help restore governance and protect a vulnerable airport location against Soviet military operations, but also to evacuate the more than 600 American students attending St. George's University.

The Iran Hostage Crisis a few years earlier, in which 52 U.S. diplomats and citizens were held and released from captivity after 444 days, was still fresh on the minds of most Americans.

Determined to avoid a similar situation, President Reagan ordered the military to plan and swiftly execute Operation Urgent Fury.

[Larry King] So we originally were planning to go to Beirut because it had been an ongoing operation for well over a year, and there was still unrest between Israel and Lebanon.

When we got the call to go to Grenada and the Beirut bombing happened on the 23rd, two days before we went into Grenada... and 241 of our comrades had been taken, we were disturbed, angered because we felt like we should have been there and that we should go there to help them right now.

And we didn't understand the ramifications of what we were embarking upon in Grenada, and felt like we were dissuaded from being there to help our brothers.

-Then the whispers started happening like, you know, "Did you hear about Grenada?"

And people were like, "Grenada, what is that?"

And it's a small island, it's got some American students going to medical school, and we're going to rescue them, like that.

-So we headed down there and held off the coast and were on the ship on the 23rd, thinking that we may actually go in.

But I got to back up and say that it cost me a steak dinner when we landed because I made a bet with my company executive officer who said, "Sir, I think we're going in.

I think we're going to go on and land on Grenada."

I said, "No, John, we're not going to go."

And I said, "I'll bet you your steak dinner we don't go."

And I wound up buying him a steak dinner.

[Joseph Carleno] And it got real quiet, real serious.

You know, we were explained to what needed to be done in Grenada, and that it was important, we had to do it.

But we were anxious to go to Beirut, Lebanon, and get a little payback maybe, you know, everybody.

[Larry King] It's a very helpless feeling.

But, you know, you have to take your orders, and there's somebody up there who's pulling the strings and we're just taught to do our duty.

So once we got to Grenada, we really didn't have time to think about Beirut.

[Bo Dyess] The mission, as I understood it, was to evacuate the American students that were in the True Blue Campus, which was just north of the runway.

But they also lived in the surrounding areas.

[Mike Jinnett] Our mission in Grenada was pretty straightforward.

Do landings to secure airfields to allow for follow-on forces, and then to secure the rescue of American citizens.

There was a question about where we would actually pick them up, but our mission was to get them off of Grand Anse Beach and get them safely to Salines.

-We were supposed to go in at zero-two in the morning; that got further delayed to zero-four and then zero-five.

And we also found out that our objective that we had planned for had been changed because Special Operations Forces and Rangers and the 82nd Airborne were also going to be part of this operation.

[Robert Paylor] They formed up in what they called a stick.

It was six to eight Marines with some light infantry, some with heavier weapons.

And this young lad looked up at me.

He was painted in the camouflage face paint, and he said, "I joined the Navy so I wouldn't have to do this [bleep]."

And I looked at him closely, he was a Navy corpsman what the other services call a medic.

The Marines don't have any of their own, they come from the Navy.

So he was going ashore with the first waves of the assault.

They went up and got in the helicopters who took off... in three waves, I think.

And I just remember seeing their lights disappearing, and then their lights went out.

They turn them off.

So there they go.

Godspeed.

-I was in the first wave, the launch, and I actually cycled back three times, twice back for fuel, the third time back to pick up the troops.

Then we gathered up, formed up, and we flew into Pearls Airfield.

That's where we made our initial assault on the east side of the island with the Marines.

[Robert Paylor] For about an hour, it seemed as if nothing had happened.

And then, helicopters started coming back, some simply to refuel, some to pick up the second wave for the assault, and some wounded already, started coming aboard.

Became obvious pretty quickly that, yes, they had met resistance.

And the island was much more fortified than you would think a small country of that size would be or should be.

And we learned over the next two and a half, three days, that was it not only the...

I think the right way to say it is Grenadine, Grenadine Defense Force that they had.

They were a bunch of Cuban forces, and some who looked to be either Eastern European or Russian were on the island.

[Michael Dick] It wasn't too long, though, before we began to capture some maps and some equipment from the local militia and the PRA.

But we were really in the dark as to the tactical situation.

Our Marines were able to engage with the civilians, and we gained a whole lot of information from them as to who the military leaders were and military members were.

So what had happened was that the Amphibious Task Force had reported that a platoon of SEALs who had been sent in to protect and evacuate the Governor-General of Grenada were surrounded and in trouble.

[John Holloway] But they were surrounded by People's Revolutionary Army troops and BTR-60s, and I think they didn't, they didn't feel comfortable trying to, you know, shoot their way out because they had this guy with them who they had to protect.

[Ted Knight] When I was laying down on the ground in a prone position, I was laying next to a Vietnam veteran and he told me, "It's going to be okay.

You're going to be alright.

I promise you, this ain't nothing.

We're gonna go out, we're going to do what we got to do, and this is going to be over before you know it."

But we were the support platoon in case anything happened.

And so, we were just laying there, waiting.

That's when my life changed.

That's when it was different.

And about maybe 30 minutes later, we heard some shots rang out, a lot of shooting.

We heard explosions going off, and then I heard, "Support, get up, you're going to get the wounded."

We heard C-130 Puff the Magic Dragon, I call them Puff the Magic Dragon, or AC-130 gunship.

It came flying around the compound, and all I could hear was: brrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr, brrrrrrrrrrrrr.

I mean, it was flying down to the compound.

Brrrrr.

A nd they must have did it maybe... maybe about four or five times as it was circling the compound.

And... it was bodies everywhere.

It was Cuban bodies everywhere.

I mean, it was nowhere that a Cuban could hide.

And we went in, and everything that moved, we were shooting at it.

I was scared.

Yeah, I was, I was scared.

That was my first time ever being scared, and I was scared.

[Robert Paylor] I remember two aircraft that were lost to enemy fire.

They were Marine Cobras.

On the first one, one of the pilots was later killed by the local troops, the other one was rescued, but was missing half his arm where a bullet anti-aircraft round had taken it off.

The second helo was lost when it was coming in, providing support in a rescue attempt for the first helo.

It was shot down and went in the ocean.

I remember seeing an Army colonel on one of the upper decks that day, and he looked at me and he said, he said, "You all right there?"

I said, "Yes, sir, this is something."

And he looked at me, this was on the first day, late in the first day, he said, "Yeah, there's been people killed today."

[Larry King] It brings the realities of this type of thing in, and it's not pretty, and it's something that you can't train for.

And that's why some people have a problem forgetting those sights.

But I think that it helps us sometimes to remember those things, to push us on towards greater things and continued perseverance.

[Larry Sloan] We flew inland, hit our checkpoints.

We immediately became engaged with intense fire.

Both ridgelines opened up.

I could see flashes and tracers.

I heard the aircraft being hit by gunfire.

The right door gunner was hit.

The right front seat screamed that he was hit.

The caution panel lights were flashing.

We were still flying.

The aircraft was holding together.

I felt a sharp slap on my back.

Didn't feel any real pain.

Flight lead keyed the radio and said, "Tighten up, we're going in again."

So we came around.

This time, the fire was just as accurate.

It was much more intense.

And we decided to abort the mission.

The aircraft was just too shot up trying to get in.

We were supposed to go to the airport there at Point Salines, and we couldn't do it.

It wasn't secured.

The Rangers were just then jumping in.

So the decision was made to go to the Navy ships that we had observed on the horizon.

And that was an impressive sight, seeing that flotilla out there.

So the pilot decided to pick a single spot airframe or a ship, and we began our approach.

We had no radio contact because, as I said, we didn't even know the Navy was going to be there.

We began our approach.

The deck crew was frantically waving us off as we continue to try to land.

The pilot continued his approach and wisely, the Navy personnel jumped out of the way, and we landed on the deck.

-And the control mechanisms to shut down the engines were shot away, and the copilot couldn't shut the engines down.

And there's a very famous picture of the Navy going out with fire hoses and drowning out the engines of the Black Hawk because they couldn't shut it down.

And they removed the pilot who was very seriously shot up.

[Larry Sloan] The aircraft that I was on had 32 entry holes in the airframe.

It's now about 7:30 in the morning.

I'm laying on the deck of the USS Moosbrugger... We were transported by CH-46 to the Guam, where we were taken to the sickbay.

It was sometime during the day that some of my soldiers came in to check on us to see how we were doing.

And... and that's when I learned that... one of my pilots had been killed.

Captain Keith Lucas.

He had been flying Chalk Four.

The soldiers were very protective not to give me too much information because they knew I was in no condition.

And finally later, that night, the doctor operated on me.

And I can recall as he removed the bullet, he dropped it into a pan that he had by the side.

And I can recall the metallic clink which reminded me of the old Western movies that you see Doc Holliday operating on, on his folks.

[Larry King] One of the problems that we had, we didn't have enough intelligence on anything in Grenada.

We didn't know who we were fighting, how many there were, what kind of weapons they had, and who we had to evacuate.

We found out there were two campuses of medical school.

So the Army was able to get the True Blue people on the first day, and then we flew in the Rangers on the second day to get them out of Grand Anse.

-[sighs] Like, all the intelligence of the operation was bad.

They had pictures taken, and they said the beach was very, very wide.

You can safely land on the beach.

The pictures were taken at low tide.

Guess what time we went in... high tide.

So the 46s went in.

And of course, when you pull power to control your rate of descent, all these palm trees are swaying this way.

And the moment you land, you take power off, here come the palm trees.

Aircraft 00 is hit by palm trees.

Helicopters don't fly very well with half the rotor blades.

So they had to shut down and that aircraft had to be abandoned.

-My role in helping to evacuate the American students, I knew that there had already been a large portion of the students evacuated from the True Blue Campus, which was north of the runway there in Point Salines.

When we went down onto the Lance aux Épines Peninsula, there were students there that had not been evacuated nor contacted, or had contact with the American forces.

There had been a shoot-to-kill order issued by the government of Grenada when the coup happened, and the assassination happened .

So they were afraid to even leave their house.

And they knew that there was activity going on.

They could hear the fighting on the next peninsula over, they knew that things were happening over at the airport.

But this one peninsula that was-- had not been cleared yet.

And my role was to be part of the forces.

And I think I was the lead force going on the peninsula that morning to contact the Americans that were there to tell them that there was additional evacuations occurring, and there was a place where the helicopters were going to land to get the students and then take them back over to the airport.

And then from there, they would be loaded on American transport aircraft and going back to the States.

The students that I met were so relieved to see us.

I think that they had been scared from the shoot-to-kill order that was given by the government, but when they saw us and they saw US Army, they were so relieved and so happy.

One guy threw me the keys to his house.

He said, "My house is over there, beer's in the refrigerator.

I'm not coming back here, help yourself."

Of course, we couldn't do that part, but we evacuated those students to helicopters and got them flown over to the airfield for evacuation.

[Mike Jinnett] When we got back to Salines and all those medical students, those Americans that we rescued were safe and alive and cheering... and cheering what we had done... and hugging us... it had come full circle from being called a "baby murderer," back in 1971.

[Robert Paylor] One thing we learned from Grenada, we didn't know how to talk to each other, and by "we," I'm talking about the U.S. military.

Army had its own way of doing things, Air Force, Navy, Marines, we all had our own way of doing things and our own way of communicating, et cetera, et cetera.

[Larry King] We were not able to talk to the Army or to Special Operations and that affected the way that we could help them and coordinate operations.

We need to continually push information so that the people who have to execute are in the know.

It's hard to put together a plan when you don't have any information about the, who the enemy is, where they are, and what the objectives might be.

-I think Goldwater-Nichols, which was passed in 1986, was a direct result of both the failed Iranian hostage mission and the Operation Urgent Fury.

So I think one of the biggest lessons that came out of that was a lack of joint coordination or joint communications between forces that were rapidly put together.

They've got to be able to talk to each other, and they've got to be able to train together.

-Nowadays, the military is very, very universal.

You go to one military base, you can expect to see people from all the branches of the military working on that base, operating on that base.

You know, there are commands that have Army units, Navy units, Air Force units, you know, Coast Guard units, all working together.

It's a lot more common.

And back then, it really wasn't.

So I think it's a lot better in many ways that everybody's kind of joining together and working together, sharing information, and trying to accomplish, you know, the common goal.

-The results of Operation Urgent Fury... well, I mean, quite honestly, we accomplished every mission and every task.

The U.S. students were released or freed, and they gratefully acknowledge the fact that we did it.

The communism was stemmed in the Caribbean, and the Grenadian people were freed of an oppressive, ruthless government.

-I think around Day 28, the assault was on the 25th of October.

On the 28th, we began doing mopping up operations, things had quieted down.

The Grenadian people themselves were just very appreciative to have us there and be reestablishing some civility and peace in the region for their small island there.

-Tell Mr. Reagan all Grenadians are happy to know that he took this step in time to save our lives, and may God bless him.

[Doug Doerr] I remember the Guam had circled the entire island, and those colorful flags that you see on ships' masts.

I didn't know what they meant, but all these little flags flying... God... Bless... You...

It was flying from the Guam to all the people on the island of Grenada.

[Larry Sloan] One of my memories from Grenada was, the response and gratitude of the American people towards the army and soldiers.

It was very different than what I experienced when I came home from Vietnam.

I returned home from Vietnam on July 6, 1971.

I came through San Francisco Airport.

I was confronted by Hare Krishna, who asked me if my medals were for killing babies.

The response by the American public at that time against our army and the military and those who served in Vietnam was uncalled for, unprecedented, and most assuredly undeserved.

It was nice to see the difference of what the American public did in just a little over ten years.

[Larry King] I was a young pilot, 25 at the time, and was not prepared for what I saw in this particular cruise in Grenada and Beirut.

I had great training.

I was ready to do my job, but I did not understand the ramifications of what war was really like.

And once you have been in combat, it changes you.

Someone once said that courage is not the absence of fear, but the persistence through fear.

And I felt very much that that was a state of mind.

[Doug Doerr] Taught me to appreciate life because you never know what you have.

Really taught me to appreciate our Marines who are the real unsung heroes.

Those crew chiefs, they do something wrong or don't fix something correctly, you're going to pay a severe penalty when we all go in.

Those maintenance kids, the avionics men, the hydraulics men, the metal shop people, the jet engine mechanics, all they get is tasked day after day after day to keep these aircraft flying.

So that whole experience taught me, you take care of those Marines the best way you possibly can.

I think that experience made me a better officer.

It made me very appreciative of those Marines.

And I, to this day, I love them all like they're my family.

Because they are.

-And the most important lesson I learned was about saving and protecting Marines, and American civilians, doing for others what they cannot do for themselves.

I had a chance to live that... defend my country, and bring American citizens home... safely.

[Deanna Owens] I want people to remember Joe, not as a victim .

He did what he wanted to do in life.

You know, he went out, he served his country, and he left a legacy for others to learn about.

So, for him, it was all about life.

And I want people to know that life isn't given tomorrow, that, you know, you have to take it as it is, and go on and cherish what you have.

[Ted Knight] Americans write checks for our country that most people would not imagine.

And a lot of people have paid the price.

They have paid the ultimate price, and we may not think it's right, but that's why veterans do what they do, that's why our service members do what they do for this country, so you can be able to protest, be able to speak your mind, be able to do the things you want.

-This was the beginning of the resurgence of respect for the military.

The US Marines were identified as the "Man of the Year" in 1983.

Part of it was because of Beirut, but part of it was because what we had done in Grenada.

It still is emotional.

But it also confirmed why the profession that I had chosen, the career I had chosen, was the right thing for me.. Because I could do things for people that they could not do for themselves.

[Robert Paylor] We hoped we helped the people of both Grenada and Lebanon start down a path that would lead to a better life for the ordinary folk there.

When you get past the politicians and bureaucrats, and you just get down to the ordinary folk.

Everywhere I went, anywhere in the world, we all want the same thing.

Within our heart, within our society, within our country, anywhere in the world, the greatest thing you can have, and the most precious thing that must be preserved, is hope.

Hopefully, we were able to help preserve or re-instill a sense of hope in the average person.

And if we did that, then I'd say mission accomplished.

[Narrator] In Beirut, the Lebanese Civil War lasted seven more years after the Barracks Bombing, and concluded in 1990 after a national reconciliation.

Parliamentary elections were held in 1992, although terrorism, armed conflicts, and civil unrest still exist today.

In Grenada, democracy was restored shortly after the invasion, and a successful general election held in December 1984.

To this day, Grenadians prefer the term "intervention" rather than "invasion", and in 1986, a memorial was erected as an expression of gratitude to the United States, and those who sacrificed their lives to liberate Grenada from potential communist rule.

Time after time, conflict after conflict, American servicemen have risked, and oftentimes, given their lives to protect the rights and freedoms of others.

In one week, 260 American servicemen lost their lives, 241 in the Beirut attack, and 19 during Operation Urgent Fury in Grenada.

Of those killed in action, 13 were Virginians.

Their lives cut short... but their sense of duty and heroic efforts, during their One Week in October ... never forgotten.

["Taps" - bugle call] Funding for One Week In October provided by: the Virginia War Memorial Foundation.