Ghosts of Vietnam: A private's story is not a story about combat. It follows the life of the author thru his two+ years in the service from basic training to Vietnam. The only combat situations described in his book are incidents that had a direct effect on him. He tells of the effort to overcome his fear of height and achieve his goal to become a paratrooper, and the pranks that occurred during jumps. The attempts to have him transferred to a non-infantry unit in New Jersey, and the trouble that followed when he refused to sign the papers. The eighteen day journey to Vietnam aboard a ship...