1 00:00:00,000 --> 00:00:10,640 All across America and around the world, this is Veterans Radio. 2 00:00:10,640 --> 00:00:15,920 This is Veterans Radio. 3 00:00:15,920 --> 00:00:17,840 Welcome to Veterans Radio. 4 00:00:17,840 --> 00:00:20,520 I am Jim Fossone. 5 00:00:20,520 --> 00:00:22,840 I'm the officer of the deck today. 6 00:00:22,840 --> 00:00:24,720 We've got some great programs for you. 7 00:00:24,720 --> 00:00:29,520 We always want to remind you you can find more about Veterans Radio at its Facebook 8 00:00:29,520 --> 00:00:35,240 site or at the web veteransradio.org where we're on the web 24-7. 9 00:00:35,240 --> 00:00:38,360 You can find a lot of our podcasts there as well. 10 00:00:38,360 --> 00:00:45,040 We post new ones every Tuesday so you can get a new story, a new interview, something 11 00:00:45,040 --> 00:00:49,600 you didn't know before by going to veteransradio.org. 12 00:00:49,600 --> 00:00:53,040 And before we get started we want to thank our sponsors. 13 00:00:53,040 --> 00:01:00,880 Next up we want to thank National Veteran Business Development Council, NVBDC.org. 14 00:01:00,880 --> 00:01:06,560 It was established to certify both service disabled and veteran owned businesses. 15 00:01:06,560 --> 00:01:13,080 You'll find out how they can help your business by going to NVBDC.org. 16 00:01:13,080 --> 00:01:16,600 We want to thank Legal Help for Veterans. 17 00:01:16,600 --> 00:01:22,120 Legal Help for Veterans fights for veterans disability rights all across the nation. 18 00:01:22,120 --> 00:01:33,240 You can reach them at 800-693-4800 or on the web at legalhelpforveterans.com. 19 00:01:33,240 --> 00:01:36,040 And finally, PuroClean. 20 00:01:36,040 --> 00:01:38,680 PuroClean is the paramedics of property damage. 21 00:01:38,680 --> 00:01:44,560 It provides water damage remediation, flood water removal, fire and smoke damage remediation, 22 00:01:44,560 --> 00:01:48,000 mold removal, biohazard cleanup. 23 00:01:48,000 --> 00:01:52,280 It also has a focus on veteran franchisees. 24 00:01:52,280 --> 00:01:59,440 You can learn more about them by going to puroclean.com. 25 00:01:59,440 --> 00:02:06,320 We want to welcome to Veterans Radio today Colonel Stephen P. Perkins, US Army retired. 26 00:02:06,320 --> 00:02:09,840 We're going to talk a little bit about his service but we're also going to talk with 27 00:02:09,840 --> 00:02:16,840 him about his intersection with Major General Oliver W. Dillard Sr., who's a pretty impressive 28 00:02:16,840 --> 00:02:19,520 figure I think you'll agree by the time we get done with this. 29 00:02:19,520 --> 00:02:22,000 Colonel, welcome to Veterans Radio. 30 00:02:22,000 --> 00:02:23,520 Well, thanks, Jim. 31 00:02:23,520 --> 00:02:24,680 I really appreciate it. 32 00:02:24,680 --> 00:02:26,600 It's been a while since I've seen you. 33 00:02:26,600 --> 00:02:33,600 I guess we first met back in May of 2023 at the VA Clinic dedication and I was really 34 00:02:33,600 --> 00:02:36,320 appreciative of your efforts on that. 35 00:02:36,320 --> 00:02:43,560 Well, again, Major General Dillard is somebody to talk more about and learn more about. 36 00:02:43,560 --> 00:02:45,200 But before we get in there. 37 00:02:45,200 --> 00:02:51,840 You've had a long military career and Army civilian career so that our veteran radio 38 00:02:51,840 --> 00:02:54,800 listeners kind of know you're a guy who knows what he's talking about. 39 00:02:54,800 --> 00:03:00,560 Tell us a little bit about your military and Army civilian career. 40 00:03:00,560 --> 00:03:08,960 Yes, I was commissioned out of Cameron University, which is right there by Fort Sill, Oklahoma. 41 00:03:08,960 --> 00:03:14,520 And immediately after coming out of the Guard for almost two years as an artillery officer, 42 00:03:14,520 --> 00:03:17,360 I became an infantry officer. 43 00:03:17,360 --> 00:03:23,560 Did that for about 10 years, including service with the 82nd Airborne Division and the 25th 44 00:03:23,560 --> 00:03:27,640 Infantry Division, and then made the transition to military intelligence. 45 00:03:27,640 --> 00:03:36,320 I commanded battalion at Fort Stewart and got a chance to go to Iraq in 2006-2007. 46 00:03:36,320 --> 00:03:43,920 But really the biggest thing for me, in addition to doing a bunch of those things in the Army, 47 00:03:43,920 --> 00:03:46,880 was coming out and being a civilian. 48 00:03:46,880 --> 00:03:55,080 And using those skills that I had acquired over the course of 28 years and going into 49 00:03:55,080 --> 00:04:00,360 a civilian service that I didn't know exactly what it was getting into, but it was one of 50 00:04:00,360 --> 00:04:07,520 those things that we immediately made the transition from Fort MacPherson, Georgia, 51 00:04:07,520 --> 00:04:13,840 in the Atlanta area, to Fort Bragg slash Fort Liberty here in North Carolina. 52 00:04:13,840 --> 00:04:18,680 It was during that time period that I first really discovered General Dillard, even though 53 00:04:18,680 --> 00:04:22,680 he was an infantry officer, kind of turned him my officer. 54 00:04:22,680 --> 00:04:29,520 And immediately, you know, my ears perked that, hey, this was an opportunity to do something 55 00:04:29,520 --> 00:04:34,520 for our first G2 here at Force Comm, where forces command. 56 00:04:34,520 --> 00:04:37,800 So I'm going to stop you there on a couple of things, because we've got listeners who 57 00:04:37,800 --> 00:04:42,280 are not as familiar with the lingo. 58 00:04:42,280 --> 00:04:46,800 So tell us what the, you transferred into the Military Intelligence Corps, and I know 59 00:04:46,800 --> 00:04:51,280 there would be plenty of people who would make a joke at this point about that being 60 00:04:51,280 --> 00:04:52,800 an Axi Moran. 61 00:04:52,800 --> 00:04:55,880 But tell us what military intelligence is about. 62 00:04:55,880 --> 00:05:04,120 Yeah, pretty much in my case, it was to be a tactical intelligence officer, meaning that 63 00:05:04,120 --> 00:05:09,680 I would find out about the enemy, analyze it, and give it to my commander as he made 64 00:05:09,680 --> 00:05:10,680 decisions. 65 00:05:10,680 --> 00:05:15,080 In my case, I also became a counterintelligence officer. 66 00:05:15,080 --> 00:05:22,040 And so it was one of those things of, I won't say we're the James Bond's of the military, 67 00:05:22,040 --> 00:05:29,240 but we're people that go out and use information gathered from other sources, like the, about 68 00:05:29,240 --> 00:05:31,880 the adversary, and bring it back to our commanders. 69 00:05:31,880 --> 00:05:39,560 So really, it's just a matter of, in my case, I had a vested knee as an infantry officer, 70 00:05:39,560 --> 00:05:45,440 and I said, well, you know, I probably need a couple of skills before I retire. 71 00:05:45,440 --> 00:05:52,280 And so I went in and I was intrigued by the intelligence field, and they gave me an opportunity 72 00:05:52,280 --> 00:05:53,280 to do that. 73 00:05:53,280 --> 00:05:58,640 Well, I would also point out to our listeners that Colonel Perkins picked up his master's 74 00:05:58,640 --> 00:06:04,360 degree in strategic studies from the US Army War College back in 2001. 75 00:06:04,360 --> 00:06:10,000 So both experience and educated in this general area. 76 00:06:10,000 --> 00:06:14,760 I want to get another thing out of the way here before you go on and tell the story about 77 00:06:14,760 --> 00:06:16,260 General Dillard. 78 00:06:16,260 --> 00:06:19,320 And that is, you mentioned the term G2. 79 00:06:19,320 --> 00:06:26,200 So explain to the listeners, what is the G2 designation in the Army? 80 00:06:26,200 --> 00:06:36,080 Yeah, G2s are essentially go back to the Napoleonic era to where Napoleon had, gave numbers to 81 00:06:36,080 --> 00:06:42,400 the, the various skills or offices that he had on his staff. 82 00:06:42,400 --> 00:06:50,200 So G1s being personnel, G3s being operations, and G4s being logistics. 83 00:06:50,200 --> 00:06:56,520 So G2 is the intel or intelligence and security aspects of a staff. 84 00:06:56,520 --> 00:07:01,280 So that person's actually trained. 85 00:07:01,280 --> 00:07:05,840 Sometimes it's an inherent thing, which is kind of the way it was for General Dillard 86 00:07:05,840 --> 00:07:07,440 in the beginning. 87 00:07:07,440 --> 00:07:12,200 So S2s or G2s, depending upon what level of staff. 88 00:07:12,200 --> 00:07:14,200 So generals get a G2. 89 00:07:14,200 --> 00:07:17,480 The other guys just get S2s. 90 00:07:17,480 --> 00:07:27,480 And that was really General Dillard's first exposure to a staff was he was the S2 for 91 00:07:27,480 --> 00:07:31,840 a battalion in, in Korea. 92 00:07:31,840 --> 00:07:36,720 Well let's go back now and, and transition this to talking about Major General Oliver 93 00:07:36,720 --> 00:07:43,200 Dillard, who was born in 1926 in Alabama. 94 00:07:43,200 --> 00:07:48,080 But tell us about his education and how he found himself in the military. 95 00:07:48,080 --> 00:07:54,880 Well, he's an interesting character in that he comes from a really a poor background, 96 00:07:54,880 --> 00:07:59,320 but not one that didn't appreciate education. 97 00:07:59,320 --> 00:08:06,400 So he came out of high school or really out of high school at about the age of 16 and 98 00:08:06,400 --> 00:08:09,360 went to Tuskegee Institute. 99 00:08:09,360 --> 00:08:14,520 And so around that same time, the war started, and he was really too young. 100 00:08:14,520 --> 00:08:17,440 So he goes to college. 101 00:08:17,440 --> 00:08:23,560 And as he starts to turn 18, well, they start looking at him being drafted. 102 00:08:23,560 --> 00:08:28,920 And so he puts in a deferment and they accept it. 103 00:08:28,920 --> 00:08:35,560 The next year, however, with 1945, he doesn't think he's, he's passed the age of getting 104 00:08:35,560 --> 00:08:38,560 into the, into the military and the draft. 105 00:08:38,560 --> 00:08:40,320 He doesn't know anything about the draft. 106 00:08:40,320 --> 00:08:48,800 And as a young black or African American student, he's, he's not sure what that whole 107 00:08:48,800 --> 00:08:51,920 thing is in the military. 108 00:08:51,920 --> 00:08:59,440 But he goes through it, even though he's in RTC at Tuskegee. 109 00:08:59,440 --> 00:09:03,960 He goes through the process and the Army says, no, we want you. 110 00:09:03,960 --> 00:09:07,880 And he goes, well, the war's already over in Europe. 111 00:09:07,880 --> 00:09:14,000 And they had other things for him to do like the occupation of Europe after the war. 112 00:09:14,000 --> 00:09:22,200 So he gets in there, sneaks in before 1946, which is really essentially when the war ends 113 00:09:22,200 --> 00:09:23,200 in Europe. 114 00:09:23,200 --> 00:09:30,520 It gets pushed over as a, in an artillery unit in Europe. 115 00:09:30,520 --> 00:09:38,480 So during that time period, he goes through, he gets identified by a white officer and 116 00:09:38,480 --> 00:09:40,760 pushed into OCS. 117 00:09:40,760 --> 00:09:46,800 So that's really the first time that he gets a, so he's got three years of college. 118 00:09:46,800 --> 00:09:54,960 He's in the, in the unit, comes out of OCS, goes through, essentially goes through the 119 00:09:54,960 --> 00:09:59,240 Korean War and then gets a chance to finish his degree. 120 00:09:59,240 --> 00:10:04,040 And he's at Commander General Staff College at Fort Leavenworth, Kansas. 121 00:10:04,040 --> 00:10:12,560 And ultimately his education ends formally when he goes through the National War College 122 00:10:12,560 --> 00:10:21,560 in Fort McNair District of Columbia and is currently, is what do you think, dual student, 123 00:10:21,560 --> 00:10:26,600 if you will, at the George Washington University. 124 00:10:26,600 --> 00:10:29,920 And so that's kind of his education background. 125 00:10:29,920 --> 00:10:36,200 And what's really sort of unique and, and here that people ought to make sure they're 126 00:10:36,200 --> 00:10:40,000 catching is he starts out as an enlisted guy. 127 00:10:40,000 --> 00:10:41,000 He does. 128 00:10:41,000 --> 00:10:44,200 His skill set is recognized. 129 00:10:44,200 --> 00:10:51,160 He's encouraged or I think he's had pushed into going to officer candidate school so 130 00:10:51,160 --> 00:10:58,120 that he can move from enlisted to an officer, which normally would have required that degree. 131 00:10:58,120 --> 00:11:04,480 They get him through OCS, they get him through making sure he picks up his degree. 132 00:11:04,480 --> 00:11:08,160 And now he's on a whole different path, isn't he? 133 00:11:08,160 --> 00:11:09,160 He is. 134 00:11:09,160 --> 00:11:16,760 And he's only one of the three black students in the Commander General Staff College immediately 135 00:11:16,760 --> 00:11:23,120 following that he goes to the University of Omaha now in Nebraska, Omaha, and like a special 136 00:11:23,120 --> 00:11:25,760 program for people like him. 137 00:11:25,760 --> 00:11:29,040 Nowadays, we actually don't let him go that deep. 138 00:11:29,040 --> 00:11:36,800 They have to basically get it before their degree before they are captains. 139 00:11:36,800 --> 00:11:41,120 And so he's already a major at that time. 140 00:11:41,120 --> 00:11:47,120 And but he's being recognized as being a fast mover, if you will, at the time. 141 00:11:47,120 --> 00:11:54,680 And this is really he was in a when he went to Korea back in 5051. 142 00:11:54,680 --> 00:11:57,360 He was in the segregated unit. 143 00:11:57,360 --> 00:12:03,240 So now we fast forward to basically the CGSE class of 58. 144 00:12:03,240 --> 00:12:10,160 And he's now one of only three students in that whole class that are lack of a better 145 00:12:10,160 --> 00:12:16,120 term today, a person of color that are making it through that that course. 146 00:12:16,120 --> 00:12:19,760 So the Army is definitely starting to identify him. 147 00:12:19,760 --> 00:12:28,640 And he's a person at that point with a Silver Star and a CIB Combat Infantryman's Badge. 148 00:12:28,640 --> 00:12:33,040 So he is being looked on as being a fast mover, if you will. 149 00:12:33,040 --> 00:12:40,320 But he's in a position where there aren't a lot of black soldiers or officers. 150 00:12:40,320 --> 00:12:43,760 One there aren't a lot of black soldiers, but they're definitely not a lot of black 151 00:12:43,760 --> 00:12:45,560 officers. 152 00:12:45,560 --> 00:12:54,680 And so he's fighting upstream, but being helped along the way because he's showing some potential 153 00:12:54,680 --> 00:12:55,680 and competence. 154 00:12:55,680 --> 00:12:57,560 Well, it's more than potential. 155 00:12:57,560 --> 00:12:58,560 It was right. 156 00:12:58,560 --> 00:13:02,840 I mean, he really was a very competent officer. 157 00:13:02,840 --> 00:13:11,240 And fortunately, you know, the Army recognizes this and tell us about how he moved over to 158 00:13:11,240 --> 00:13:16,160 military intelligence, which brings us back to that's not an oxymoron. 159 00:13:16,160 --> 00:13:19,040 So tell us how that move occurred. 160 00:13:19,040 --> 00:13:22,280 You can't let that one die, can you? 161 00:13:22,280 --> 00:13:23,280 I can't. 162 00:13:23,280 --> 00:13:24,280 I can't. 163 00:13:24,280 --> 00:13:25,280 Yeah. 164 00:13:25,280 --> 00:13:26,280 Yeah. 165 00:13:26,280 --> 00:13:27,280 It's an interesting thing. 166 00:13:27,280 --> 00:13:33,560 Back in his day, we really didn't have a military intelligence branch. 167 00:13:33,560 --> 00:13:39,480 So you can be an infantry officer, but also be an intel, what we'll call an intelligence 168 00:13:39,480 --> 00:13:45,160 officer just to keep us from having the oxymoron come in. 169 00:13:45,160 --> 00:13:47,960 But you could do both. 170 00:13:47,960 --> 00:13:56,120 And in my day, there were only, when I made the transition, they still had the program 171 00:13:56,120 --> 00:14:03,720 which was kind of like a dual, dual branch, but you could be what was called an 1135, 172 00:14:03,720 --> 00:14:06,880 which is an infantry intel. 173 00:14:06,880 --> 00:14:09,280 And when I came in, they quit doing that. 174 00:14:09,280 --> 00:14:10,800 They had done, they had quit that. 175 00:14:10,800 --> 00:14:15,040 But my first boss, believe it or not, was an infantry officer. 176 00:14:15,040 --> 00:14:21,600 My first intelligence supervisor was an infantry officer with an intel background. 177 00:14:21,600 --> 00:14:29,920 So what really made it so hard was that you had to know all of these things intel-wise, 178 00:14:29,920 --> 00:14:33,360 but you were constantly going back and being an iftremend. 179 00:14:33,360 --> 00:14:38,440 Now the good side to that is that you never quit being an iftremend. 180 00:14:38,440 --> 00:14:44,520 And so you were able to give that perspective of an infantry officer to intel people. 181 00:14:44,520 --> 00:14:50,320 And General Dillard was famous for his view that we need to get people out of the suits 182 00:14:50,320 --> 00:14:52,520 and into the boots. 183 00:14:52,520 --> 00:14:58,360 And he jokingly said that, but he was serious about it, that there were a bunch of people 184 00:14:58,360 --> 00:15:04,760 that believed counterintelligence people just needed to be in suits, walking around, looking 185 00:15:04,760 --> 00:15:05,760 cool and whatever. 186 00:15:05,760 --> 00:15:14,040 And his answer was no, you need to be in these boots and be irrelevant to the tactical soldier. 187 00:15:14,040 --> 00:15:18,320 So not strategic focus, but tactical focus. 188 00:15:18,320 --> 00:15:26,240 And again, he sort of had this unique perspective because he started over on the enlisted side, 189 00:15:26,240 --> 00:15:32,480 artillery in Europe before kind of moving in a different direction. 190 00:15:32,480 --> 00:15:37,920 And one of the sort of, you know, sometimes there's a life's a circle, he ends up as the 191 00:15:37,920 --> 00:15:43,160 first black deputy chief of staff intelligence for the US Army Europe. 192 00:15:43,160 --> 00:15:49,240 But he couldn't have imagined that when he went over there and say 1946 or seven. 193 00:15:49,240 --> 00:15:57,200 Jim, I can't imagine that today that you could take an infantry officer and basically put 194 00:15:57,200 --> 00:16:06,480 him into a two star billet of the of a organization that is in charge of all the land forces 195 00:16:06,480 --> 00:16:08,920 in Europe during the Cold War. 196 00:16:08,920 --> 00:16:15,880 I mentioned during the Cold War, so we're ready to go to war at any time. 197 00:16:15,880 --> 00:16:18,480 This is not Vietnam's done. 198 00:16:18,480 --> 00:16:23,720 And we now the whole focus of the US Army is on Europe. 199 00:16:23,720 --> 00:16:26,040 And he is the lead intel guy. 200 00:16:26,040 --> 00:16:29,080 I can't even imagine how tough that is. 201 00:16:29,080 --> 00:16:36,440 And the scrutiny that he's being put under because he's not a true blood. 202 00:16:36,440 --> 00:16:37,440 Am I officer? 203 00:16:37,440 --> 00:16:42,480 Yeah, well, and again, and this is so much of life in general, just not the Army. 204 00:16:42,480 --> 00:16:46,160 But you know, he didn't go to West Point, it's not a ring knocker, right? 205 00:16:46,160 --> 00:16:48,040 He's African American. 206 00:16:48,040 --> 00:16:50,240 So he doesn't fit in in that regards. 207 00:16:50,240 --> 00:16:57,920 He went to Tuskegee Institute, which has a huge reputation in more more in the Air Force 208 00:16:57,920 --> 00:17:01,640 side, the Army Air Corps were side, than it does in the regular Army side. 209 00:17:01,640 --> 00:17:08,280 So just a whole lot of different pathways that got him to into all of these first, do 210 00:17:08,280 --> 00:17:13,720 you want to talk to us about some of the first that he's kind of broke the broke the glass 211 00:17:13,720 --> 00:17:14,720 on? 212 00:17:14,720 --> 00:17:20,000 Well, I'm not sure I can remember all the first that he did. 213 00:17:20,000 --> 00:17:26,520 I will say this, he was only the fifth general officer when he penned on his star. 214 00:17:26,520 --> 00:17:32,320 So there's not a lot of precedence for this, and you hit on a key point that he wasn't 215 00:17:32,320 --> 00:17:39,400 the typical guy and and we taught you, you talked about not being a ring knocker. 216 00:17:39,400 --> 00:17:46,960 He's not even that he's a mustang or what some call this thing, which is an OCS guy. 217 00:17:46,960 --> 00:17:53,600 So most of the OCS guys don't get an opportunity to make it as far as he did. 218 00:17:53,600 --> 00:18:00,080 And I'm trying to I guess the biggest thing that he was the first on was he was the first 219 00:18:00,080 --> 00:18:08,200 officer to attend the National War College in in DC. 220 00:18:08,200 --> 00:18:11,240 And that was problem and go ahead. 221 00:18:11,240 --> 00:18:16,560 Well I have from his introduction to the Michigan Military and Veterans Hall of Honor, another 222 00:18:16,560 --> 00:18:20,960 little paragraph I'll read which says, General Dillard served as the first black general 223 00:18:20,960 --> 00:18:26,360 officer in the office of the Assistant Chief of Staff for Intelligence, the last J2 for 224 00:18:26,360 --> 00:18:32,400 the US military assistance command Vietnam, the first US Army forces command Deputy Chief 225 00:18:32,400 --> 00:18:36,960 of Staff Intelligence, and the first black Deputy Chief of Staff Intelligence for the 226 00:18:36,960 --> 00:18:42,760 US Army Europe prior all that prior to obviously to his retirement from the Army in 1980. 227 00:18:42,760 --> 00:18:47,320 I mean, along the way, there are a whole lot of firsts aren't there? 228 00:18:47,320 --> 00:18:51,080 You know, they really are. 229 00:18:51,080 --> 00:18:57,560 The funny thing is, as I was researching even more into General Dillard, you brought up 230 00:18:57,560 --> 00:19:07,480 the point of where he's the final military assistance command Vietnam J2, meaning the 231 00:19:07,480 --> 00:19:11,000 joint staff general officer command. 232 00:19:11,000 --> 00:19:14,760 The guys are in charge of all of Vietnam. 233 00:19:14,760 --> 00:19:19,360 He didn't go there during that tour to be the intel officer. 234 00:19:19,360 --> 00:19:22,760 He had gone back to being the infantry guy again. 235 00:19:22,760 --> 00:19:31,120 And so he was the the Deputy Chief of Staff for the Cords program, which is basically 236 00:19:31,120 --> 00:19:37,400 the civilian advisory and development program in Vietnam. 237 00:19:37,400 --> 00:19:41,840 It was only to the point of we were about to get out of Vietnam. 238 00:19:41,840 --> 00:19:47,080 And so the J2, he left. 239 00:19:47,080 --> 00:19:50,520 The war is not even over and this guy leaves. 240 00:19:50,520 --> 00:19:56,600 And so they're going, OK, well, we need a strong intel guy. 241 00:19:56,600 --> 00:19:57,600 Didn't Ollie? 242 00:19:57,600 --> 00:19:59,600 What in the intel guy? 243 00:19:59,600 --> 00:20:01,600 Yeah, we give it to him. 244 00:20:01,600 --> 00:20:05,960 And so they walked over and said, hey, Ollie, do you want to do this? 245 00:20:05,960 --> 00:20:15,680 And he thinks about a little bit and remembering that some of the he's got about, I think, 246 00:20:15,680 --> 00:20:20,960 four things that he tries to think of in life. 247 00:20:20,960 --> 00:20:25,880 Part of it, one of his final ones is seize opportunities when you have the ability to 248 00:20:25,880 --> 00:20:26,880 seize opportunities. 249 00:20:26,880 --> 00:20:27,880 Wow. 250 00:20:27,880 --> 00:20:33,320 Isn't that a pearl of wisdom that needs to be passed down to everybody? 251 00:20:33,320 --> 00:20:35,720 This isn't a job he was looking for. 252 00:20:35,720 --> 00:20:39,520 Not even sure it was a job that he wanted, but it was an opportunity and you kind of 253 00:20:39,520 --> 00:20:42,880 have to grab the bull by the horns, don't you? 254 00:20:42,880 --> 00:20:43,880 You do. 255 00:20:43,880 --> 00:20:50,560 And beyond even that, Jim, you have to be ready to do that. 256 00:20:50,560 --> 00:20:57,440 So he's preparing, he's thinking about these things all during that time period. 257 00:20:57,440 --> 00:21:07,520 So he's already had a two year tour being a provincial military advisor up there in 258 00:21:07,520 --> 00:21:18,200 Can Thun province with General Nguyen, Nguyen Hop Dwan is the guy's name, the last mayor 259 00:21:18,200 --> 00:21:20,160 of Saigon. 260 00:21:20,160 --> 00:21:24,560 And these guys have gotten along really well and he's really made his name, Ollie's made 261 00:21:24,560 --> 00:21:31,440 his name up there in that province of how they have, his advisory team has really done 262 00:21:31,440 --> 00:21:34,320 a good job of working with the people. 263 00:21:34,320 --> 00:21:41,320 And he's got those kind of tentacles, if you will, that he can kind of pull from, but big 264 00:21:41,320 --> 00:21:44,960 time that he recognized opportunity. 265 00:21:44,960 --> 00:21:48,760 Well, you have to be ready for the opportunity. 266 00:21:48,760 --> 00:21:52,480 You have to have the skill set, the communication, the analytical thinking. 267 00:21:52,480 --> 00:21:55,240 He's demonstrated all of that at that point. 268 00:21:55,240 --> 00:22:00,120 And we're talking to Colonel Stephen Perkins, US Army retired. 269 00:22:00,120 --> 00:22:07,040 He helped a Major General Oliver Dillard write his book, Little Old War Stories, and 270 00:22:07,040 --> 00:22:13,320 Steve has authored a number of articles on General Dillard's career, including the Forgotten 271 00:22:13,320 --> 00:22:18,840 Sable Officer, which was published in the Military Intelligence and Professional Journal. 272 00:22:18,840 --> 00:22:26,480 You are, if you will, Steve, and the family views you this way as sort of the official 273 00:22:26,480 --> 00:22:30,760 biographer for Major General Oliver Dillard. 274 00:22:30,760 --> 00:22:33,160 How did you find yourself in that role? 275 00:22:33,160 --> 00:22:42,400 Well, it was because him being the first General Officer or the first intel guy, G2, at Forces 276 00:22:42,400 --> 00:22:43,400 Command. 277 00:22:43,400 --> 00:22:52,080 We had just taken over and we had a new building at Fort Liberty, Fort Bragg. 278 00:22:52,080 --> 00:22:54,760 And so we started naming conference rooms. 279 00:22:54,760 --> 00:23:01,400 We had about three conference rooms that we were going to try to name after people. 280 00:23:01,400 --> 00:23:05,840 And so as we did that, they said, well, you can't name after people. 281 00:23:05,840 --> 00:23:07,840 I went, okay. 282 00:23:07,840 --> 00:23:10,520 There's a rule. 283 00:23:10,520 --> 00:23:11,720 Right. 284 00:23:11,720 --> 00:23:15,160 And so I said, that's fine. 285 00:23:15,160 --> 00:23:21,400 And then I thought to myself, well, what campaigns, because you had to name them after campaigns. 286 00:23:21,400 --> 00:23:23,960 I said, what campaigns was General Dillard in? 287 00:23:23,960 --> 00:23:32,400 So the first one, which is really when he made the transition, was the UN Defensive 288 00:23:32,400 --> 00:23:35,960 Campaign of the Crea More. 289 00:23:35,960 --> 00:23:41,920 And so that's what we did was we named the conference room after him. 290 00:23:41,920 --> 00:23:46,960 And I immediately started thinking, what are the things that I can do? 291 00:23:46,960 --> 00:23:52,280 And the reason that I called the first article that we had in the Military Intelligence Professional 292 00:23:52,280 --> 00:24:03,840 Bulletin or MIPB, the reason I wrote about it and it's entitled The Sable Officer is 293 00:24:03,840 --> 00:24:14,880 I had pulled from a guy, his PhD thesis was talking about general officers that had made 294 00:24:14,880 --> 00:24:18,440 something of themselves. 295 00:24:18,440 --> 00:24:24,440 And he talks about the reason he chooses instead of black is he goes with Sable. 296 00:24:24,440 --> 00:24:30,360 And the reason is that he says, well, people come in all kinds of colors. 297 00:24:30,360 --> 00:24:35,840 And Sable is it has multi-colors. 298 00:24:35,840 --> 00:24:39,600 And so that was how he did it. 299 00:24:39,600 --> 00:24:45,160 And I went after the title and I said, you know, he is to me, he was the alt from an 300 00:24:45,160 --> 00:24:47,880 MI standpoint, an intelligence standpoint. 301 00:24:47,880 --> 00:24:59,960 He was the quintessential perfect person to show how people have grown since 1951, 53, 302 00:24:59,960 --> 00:25:07,640 probably is when they really got rid of segregation, but how we had really grown as a military 303 00:25:07,640 --> 00:25:15,600 and had taken a look, had kind of grown as an organization or as an institution. 304 00:25:15,600 --> 00:25:18,560 And so he was the first. 305 00:25:18,560 --> 00:25:23,480 And so I decided that he was going to be the guy that I was going to put a lot of time 306 00:25:23,480 --> 00:25:24,480 and effort into. 307 00:25:24,480 --> 00:25:29,560 Well, he certainly deserves it because his career is phenomenal, the more you look into 308 00:25:29,560 --> 00:25:31,040 it, the more you recognize it. 309 00:25:31,040 --> 00:25:34,000 But it's been recognized by others. 310 00:25:34,000 --> 00:25:40,520 He was awarded the Military Intelligence Corps Association's Lieutenant Colonel Nolton Award 311 00:25:40,520 --> 00:25:42,640 for Excellence in Intelligence. 312 00:25:42,640 --> 00:25:48,040 He was inducted into the Officer Candidate School Hall of Fame, the Army Military Intelligence 313 00:25:48,040 --> 00:25:54,400 Hall of Fame, the Alabama Military Hall of Honor, the Michigan Military and Veterans 314 00:25:54,400 --> 00:25:56,280 Hall of Honor, most recently. 315 00:25:56,280 --> 00:26:02,560 The VA named its community clinic in Canton, Michigan in his honor. 316 00:26:02,560 --> 00:26:12,600 What was also put into the Army's Military Intelligence Hall of Fame? 317 00:26:12,600 --> 00:26:19,840 I mean, these are all outside recognitions of what a tremendous man he was, officer, 318 00:26:19,840 --> 00:26:25,640 leader, crossed a whole variety of times and circumstances. 319 00:26:25,640 --> 00:26:35,280 As we close out here, Colonel Perkins, give us your kind of overall thoughts of how Colonel 320 00:26:35,280 --> 00:26:43,440 or Major General Dillard's life should be remembered. 321 00:26:43,440 --> 00:26:51,320 He's really a guy that took on a lot of challenges. 322 00:26:51,320 --> 00:27:02,440 I used this, the dedication of the Canton facility, I used that he was our hero. 323 00:27:02,440 --> 00:27:09,120 He put a lot of effort into being an honorable person with humility. 324 00:27:09,120 --> 00:27:17,720 He always pushed himself and others to be excellent in what he did. 325 00:27:17,720 --> 00:27:23,160 Many say that you can't lead unless people know that you care. 326 00:27:23,160 --> 00:27:28,160 And he spent a lot of time gaining their respect. 327 00:27:28,160 --> 00:27:33,480 But more importantly, because that is really important, right? 328 00:27:33,480 --> 00:27:42,760 He seized opportunities, but he was able to really push the envelope on those opportunities 329 00:27:42,760 --> 00:27:49,880 because he was competent and ready to do the mission that people are going to offer to 330 00:27:49,880 --> 00:27:51,200 him. 331 00:27:51,200 --> 00:27:58,440 And again, I just think that as a former Buffalo soldier, and I actually, I'm not sure if this 332 00:27:58,440 --> 00:28:01,080 res made with you or not, but there was another. 333 00:28:01,080 --> 00:28:06,960 Although you mentioned like five or six other first, I'm going to give you another first. 334 00:28:06,960 --> 00:28:15,520 Some believe that he was that his platoon in Korea was the first American victory on 335 00:28:15,520 --> 00:28:17,880 the peninsula during that war. 336 00:28:17,880 --> 00:28:23,040 The Battle of Yechon in South Korea. 337 00:28:23,040 --> 00:28:30,040 And his platoon went in and he was very humble as he described it. 338 00:28:30,040 --> 00:28:39,320 That his company commander, it was a Buffalo soldier and a paratrooper during World War 339 00:28:39,320 --> 00:28:45,680 II, Black Paratrooper during World War II with the Triple Nickel Regiment. 340 00:28:45,680 --> 00:28:55,600 He was, there was an article on this battle written for Infantry Magazine, I believe, 341 00:28:55,600 --> 00:29:01,640 where he describes all the goodness that Oliver Diller did. 342 00:29:01,640 --> 00:29:05,720 And part of that eventually led to earning the Silver Star. 343 00:29:05,720 --> 00:29:08,200 So definitely still my hero. 344 00:29:08,200 --> 00:29:14,800 And I hope it's everybody else will read about him and understand he's got Wikipedia page, 345 00:29:14,800 --> 00:29:17,000 which he was very proud of. 346 00:29:17,000 --> 00:29:23,040 And yeah, this is this is why we tell these stories is so that we wet your appetite. 347 00:29:23,040 --> 00:29:31,480 You go do some more reading or research on them and learn more and see the attributes, 348 00:29:31,480 --> 00:29:37,480 the talents, the pearls of wisdom in his life and apply it to yours. 349 00:29:37,480 --> 00:29:45,160 And Colonel Stephen Perkins, US Army retired official biographer, if you will, for Major 350 00:29:45,160 --> 00:29:46,560 General Oliver Diller. 351 00:29:46,560 --> 00:29:50,040 I don't think there's any pay that goes with that, but at least it's a title, Steve. 352 00:29:50,040 --> 00:29:52,360 I'm cleaning. 353 00:29:52,360 --> 00:29:57,360 I want to I want to thank you for the time that you've given us today on Veterans Radio. 354 00:29:57,360 --> 00:29:59,080 Well, thanks, Jim. 355 00:29:59,080 --> 00:30:05,400 I really appreciate everybody else listening to it and you specifically of pulling out 356 00:30:05,400 --> 00:30:14,520 all even more that I know of, but may not have been able to articulate earlier than 357 00:30:14,520 --> 00:30:15,520 that. 358 00:30:15,520 --> 00:30:22,320 So thank you again for your assistance in getting me to open up even more about my hero. 359 00:30:22,320 --> 00:30:23,880 We enjoyed it. 360 00:30:23,880 --> 00:30:26,800 And I want to thank everybody for listening to Veterans Radio today. 361 00:30:26,800 --> 00:30:27,800 I am Jim Fawcone. 362 00:30:27,800 --> 00:30:30,680 It's been a pleasure to be your host. 363 00:30:30,680 --> 00:30:35,400 I'm a Veterans Disability lawyer at 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