CHANGING FACE OF WAR: WHEN JOHNNY COMES MARCHING HOME AGAIN

The face of war has changed.

In World War II, the faces were those of young men, fresh out of high school, eager to defend their country against German and Japanese forces.

That war was followed by two "conflicts" in Korea and Vietnam, where U.S. forces were a little less sure of why they were there.

Finally, there was the military action in Saudi Arabia against Iraq, titled Desert Shield and later Desert Storm. It was over relatively quickly, and more women than ever traveled overseas to help protect Kuwait.

November 11, Veterans Day, honors all who stepped out of civilian clothes and into military uniforms to do what they felt was best for the United States.

Calvin Vogelsang

World War II (1939-1945)

In January 1944, 18-year-old Calvin Vogelsang was drafted by the U.S. Army, assigned to the infantry and sent to Fort Leonard Wood for training.

"I was ready to go," Vogelsang, now 69, said. "Everyone wanted to go. The Japanese had attacked Pearl Harbor in 1941, and Hitler was working on England."

His first battle was against the Germans in southern France on Jan. 15, 1945. His first major injury was on Feb. 17, 1945.

Vogelsang's company was pinned down by machine gun fire. The squad leader asked him to take half the squad into a wooded area while the other half covered them.

It didn't work that way. A mortar shell fell among Vogelsang and his six men, killing two and wounding two.

"It felt like a mule kicked me in the face," he said. "I made it back to the first-aid station, where they gave me morphine. I woke up in a hospital."

Waking up was a frightening experience, too. Vogelsang's first sight was of a "no smoking" sign written in German, his second of a German man in a nearby bunk. Just as he was convinced he had become a prisoner of war, a medic explained that the German man was actually the prisoner, and signs were posted in English and German.

The mortar shell had broken Vogelsang's jaw, eventually causing the loss of all his teeth. He spent the rest of his service in various military hospitals, and finally was discharged on Feb. 8, 1946. The war with Japan was over, or Vogelsang would have been sent back into battle.

While Vogelsang fought, his future bride, Glenneta, was home in Cape Girardeau. She didn't know her would-be husband then, but Mrs. Vogelsang knew many others who fought and died in the war.

Unlike Desert Storm, there were no hourly updates on troop movements and victories. Mrs. Vogelsang and her friends relied on nightly radio reports, occasional movie reels and the Southeast Missourian for news about the war.

They accepted rationing of sugar, leather and gasoline, purchasing war bonds to support the troops. When Americans won a battle, they cheered. When neighbors were killed, they cried.

And, in 1947, Mrs. Vogelsang was proud to marry her veteran husband.

Cleo Mabrey

Korean War (1950-1953)

Cleo Mabrey spent time fighting in World War II and later joined the Army Reserves, but he figured his days at war were over, at least for a long time. He graduated from Southeast Missouri State University and received his teaching certificate.

Then the United States became involved in the war between North Korea and South Korea.

In September 1950, Mabrey collected one paycheck at his new teaching job before he had to say goodbye to his wife and head for Pusan, South Korea.

He was scheduled to serve with the infantry again, but a fate landed him with the artillery after thousands of his fellow soldiers headed for the front lines.

"The Korean War was, in some respects, like Vietnam," Mabrey, age 70, said. "It was hard to tell where the front lines were. One night I woke up to the sound of gunfire and found out the bivouac area had been infiltrated by the enemy. It was a heck of a battle, with everyone shooting everywhere and nobody knowing what was what."

Mabrey served as secretary to a general in his division, working at the 38th parallel, where North and South Korea are now divided. He remembers the South Korean people as friendly, the country as mountainous and beautiful.

The letters from home didn't say much about the war, and while everyone was united about the value of World War II, the Korean War was more controversial. Generals on the front wanted to take all of Korea, Mabrey said, but politicians at home in the United States were afraid of provoking Russia and China, communist allies, and escalating the war.

Fighting technology had advanced, and U.S. troops used napalm on the enemy for the first time.

"The general would tell me about that stuff," Mabrey said. "Napalm was a jelly-like substance that burned. It had a demoralizing effect on the enemy in addition to inflicting casualties."

While the popular television show "M.A.S.H.," based on the Korean War, was somewhat accurate, Mabrey said, there weren't many Hawkeyes or Radars in Korea.

He came home to his wife in the summer of 1951.

Bob Mize

Vietnam Conflict (1964-1973)

At age 66, Bob Mize is a bit older than the average Vietnam veteran. A career Air Force man, he served from January 1951 to July 1975. He spent the year between June 1969 and June 1970 flying over Asian skies on bombing missions.

He was serving in Germany when the conflict began but returned to the United States for training after he volunteered to fight.

"I had some of my buddies get shot down, so I wanted to get over there," Mize said. "When people you've known in your Air Force career get killed, you want to do something about it."

He was married with four children at the time, but his wife understood and was supportive of Mize's decision. She was used to long separations -- a way of life for a military family.

Mize was sent to Takhli Air Base in Thailand, from which he flew 158 missions. His first was June 10, 1969, when he was told to bomb supply trucks on the Ho Chi Minh Trail.

"On the map, the trail was a red line marked Highway One," Mize said. "I was looking for a concrete highway, but it was really just a dirt trail."

Mize kept flying his missions, but news from home was unsettling. While he was still in Germany, television reports showed college students and others demonstrating against U.S. involvement in Vietnam. Mize said things weren't as tough for him as for men fighting the ground war.

"They went through some pretty tough stuff, and there wasn't a hero's welcome when they came home," he said. "I had hoped people would be more supportive. Those in the military were frustrated, too, because we couldn't do what we were trained to do. The military action was run by politicians, and that's why we lost."

Again, new war technology was introduced, this time in the form of "smart bombs." As one fighter aimed a laser at the target, another dropped bombs that followed the laser beam.

While Mize said he loved flying and wouldn't have chosen any other career, he doesn't tell war stories.

"The only really big things that happened, I wouldn't want to talk about," he said.

Dawn Wise

Desert Storm (1990-1991)

Sikeston resident Dawn Wise doesn't look like the typical image of a veteran. She looks more like a model.

But she spent her 21st birthday digging a foxhole in Dhahran, Saudi Arabia, and she spent seven months of her life serving on guard duty and repairing Army vehicles.

Wise was serving at Fort Benning, Ga., when her 324th Support Battalion was put on alert. She was a newlywed, married just a year, and both she and her husband would be sent overseas and stationed two hours apart.

Her typical day included guard duty in the early morning hours, dehydrated food for breakfast, and vehicle repair until everything was finished. Scares were common.

"We had to go to Basra, near Kuwait, after the U.S. had taken it over," Wise said. "We were blowing up Iraqi tanks, and you could see the smoke. There were dead Iraqis all along the road, some of them in burned-out trucks. A lot of the soldiers were taking pictures of them."

One day, Wise was enjoying a brief shower, where she gradually let water out of a small pouch. She had put shampoo in her hair when U.S. troops began bombing Iraqi barracks. No one knew that the bombs were American, so the call went out for everyone to get in their bunkers.

Wise wrapped her shampoo-covered hair in the towel, pulled on her clothes and ran. It happened once again before the shower was completed.

Television crews were a common sight in Saudi Arabia, as were Hollywood stars and politicians. Wise sat next to a senator during one visit.

"That's the only time we got a decent meal, when the president or a movie star came over," she joked.

Wise spent time getting to know the Saudi people, visiting temples and other structures. She gave a can of juice and an MRE (meal ready to eat) to a sheepherder so she could have her picture taken on top of his camel. The ride wasn't as fun as she thought it would be, she said.

Her battalion got the news about going home two weeks before they left. Wise said she cried on the plane ride home and again when she got back to Fort Benning and saw her mother and sister.

"It was so good to see green grass," she said. "The first thing we did was go eat at Red Lobster."