From September 1970–71, Dr. Donald Lookingbill, Captain, U.S. Army, kept a diary about life on an Army base and about his experience as a general medical officer for an infantry battalion during the late days of our War in Vietnam. The diary, along with letters from his wife, also chronicles a love story about a family separated for a year by that war. Forty years later, Dr. Lookingbill, Professor Emeritus, Mayo Medical School, reflects on the many costs of war, and on the similarities between our wars in Vietnam, Iraq and Afghanistan. The mantra of the book is a statement made over a century ago: Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it.
