Posted on May 24, 2019
Survivor Of Deadly 1983 Beirut Bombing: 'We Don't Talk About It Much'
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On Oct. 23, 1983, Navy hospital corpsman James Edward Brown survived one of the deadliest terrorist attacks on Americans.
When a bomb detonated at the U.S. Marine barracks in Beirut, Brown was at his post in the sick hall on the Marine compound — about 200 yards away.
At the time, 1,800 Marines were stationed in the city during the Lebanese Civil War.
On a visit to StoryCorps last month, Brown's friend and fellow Beirut veteran, Navy hospital corpsman Mike Cline, interviewed him about that day.
"I woke up to myself falling on the floor to the crash of isopropyl alcohol bottles and a gust of wind coming through the windows," Brown, 59, told Cline, 55. "I got up and put my boots on and my flak jacket and ran out ... and didn't know what to expect."
Early that morning, a truck bearing what the Department of Defense says was the equivalent of 20,000 pounds of TNT was set off at the Marine barracks entrance, where an estimated 400 Marines were sleeping.
When a bomb detonated at the U.S. Marine barracks in Beirut, Brown was at his post in the sick hall on the Marine compound — about 200 yards away.
At the time, 1,800 Marines were stationed in the city during the Lebanese Civil War.
On a visit to StoryCorps last month, Brown's friend and fellow Beirut veteran, Navy hospital corpsman Mike Cline, interviewed him about that day.
"I woke up to myself falling on the floor to the crash of isopropyl alcohol bottles and a gust of wind coming through the windows," Brown, 59, told Cline, 55. "I got up and put my boots on and my flak jacket and ran out ... and didn't know what to expect."
Early that morning, a truck bearing what the Department of Defense says was the equivalent of 20,000 pounds of TNT was set off at the Marine barracks entrance, where an estimated 400 Marines were sleeping.
Survivor Of Deadly 1983 Beirut Bombing: 'We Don't Talk About It Much'
Posted from npr.org
Marines
Terrorism
Beirut
Military History
France
Posted >1 y ago
Responses: 8
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A real tragedy that day. I served with a former Marine that was in my first Army Reserve unit. A very impressive Monument there at Camp Lejuene and Jacksonville, NC
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LTC John Mohor
Whoops meant to add Marine who was there when it happened later serving as a Soldier etc
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I remember visiting a friend in the Wiesbaden Hospital. There were some Marines who had been transported there. It was a horrific day.
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I remember that Sunday morning very clear. I saw what happened and read my friends and best friends names who were no longer. I put it in a box, put that box on a shelf. Twenty six years later I drove down to J-Ville from New Bern (37 miles) and spent hours and hours crying at the BM. Just starting to adjust.
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