Mike Clausen; Medal of Honor winner
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in the minefield mistakenly thought he knew where he was
going. "I ran over there [and] picked up the guys that
couldn't walk," Mr. Clausen said. "The ones that could walk
were under the assumption I knew where the mines were,
obviously, and they followed every footstep I made back to
the helicopter."
Medal of Honor Winner Mike Clausen Dies
BYLINE: Adam Bernstein, Washington Post Staff Writer
Mike Clausen Jr., 56, who died in a Dallas hospital May 30
of liver failure, received the Medal of Honor, the highest
military award for valor, for rescuing a platoon of Marines
trapped in a minefield during the Vietnam War.
In the Marine Corps, Pfc. Clausen liked to disobey
authority; he had repeatedly been demoted after every
promotion.
"I will come home a live private before coming home as a
dead sergeant," he had said.
On Jan. 31, 1970, he seemed to have forgotten his credo.
That day, he was serving with Medium Helicopter Squadron
263. He was part of a mission to extract members of a Marine
platoon near Da Nang that had wandered into a minefield
while attacking the enemy. They were under heavy fire and
frozen in their places, fearing that they would trip a mine.
Mr. Clausen was crew chief of his CH-46 helicopter and
guided the pilot to a safe landing in a spot that had been
cleared by a mine explosion.
The pilot told him not to leave, but Pfc. Clausen ignored
him -- six times, as he repeatedly left the safety of the
helicopter to help carry back one dead and 11 wounded
Marines to the aircraft.
He then tried to lead the eight remaining Marines to the
copter.
On one trip, while he carried a wounded man, a mine went
off, killing a corpsman and wounding three other Marines.
"Only when he was certain that all Marines were safely
aboard did he signal the pilot to lift the helicopter," read
his Medal of Honor citation.
His other decorations included the Purple Heart and the Air
Medal.
He once told an interviewer that the Americans pinned down
in the minefield mistakenly thought he knew where he was
going.
"I ran over there [and] picked up the guys that couldn't
walk," Mr. Clausen said. "The ones that could walk were
under the assumption I knew where the mines were, obviously,
and they followed every footstep I made back to the
helicopter."
Raymond Michael Clausen Jr. was born in New Orleans and
raised in Hammond, La. After six months of college, he
joined the Marine Corps in 1966 and became a jet helicopter
mechanic.
He left the service in April 1970 and became an inspector
for the Boeing Co. Soon after, he was in a car accident that
left him comatose for months, nearly blinded in one eye and
without the strength to walk. Back at home, he had all his
furniture placed in the center of a room so he could walk
the perimeter using the wall for occasional support.
He spent his time speaking to veterans groups and continued
to suffer from poor health.
In 1996, Mr. Clausen made news reports for facing a speeding
ticket charge in Louisiana. He chose to defend himself and
was ready to do so when the state district judge ordered him
to take a sobriety test. He refused, claiming all he had had
that morning was a nonalcoholic beer. The judge sentenced
Mr. Clausen to a night in jail for contempt of court.
In court, he had worn the Medal of Honor "to remind [judges]
that people fought and died in wars to defend the
Constitution."
At his death, he was awaiting a liver transplant.
Survivors include his wife, Lois Clausen of Ponchatoula,
La.; two brothers; and a sister.
Louisiana Lou
'American hero' buried
Medal winner remembered as fun loving
By CHUCK REED
Special to The Advocate
http://www.2theadvocate.com/stories/060804/new_clausen001.shtml
PONCHATOULA --- Raymond "Mike" Clausen Jr., a Medal of Honor
recipient for his Vietnam War service, was buried Monday
with more ceremony than most of his friends said he would
have been comfortable with.
Clausen, 56, of Ponchatoula was eulogized by his commander
in Vietnam as "a true American hero who knew what he was
going into that day" when he displayed the valor that won
him the Medal of Honor.
"I told all my men to stay in that aircraft," retired Lt.
Col. Walter Ledbetter said of that day. "Every time I landed
that aircraft, he got out when he saw Marines who needed
help. He had to get out."
Several friends of Clausen spoke candidly about him at a
reception, paid for by Texas billionaire H. Ross Perot,
after the burial.
Clausen, who rescued six Marines by carrying them through a
mine field under heavy North Vietnamese ground fire Jan. 31,
1970, was a blunt, fun-loving, hard drinking, two-fisted
man, whose e-mail signature line was "Death before
Dishonor."
About five dozen uniformed Marines, Army, Navy and Air Force
servicemen, both active and retired, attended the services.
Retired Maj. Gen. James E. Livingston, former commandant of
the Marine Corps Reserves, and Lt. Gen. Dennis M. McCarthy,
current commandant of the reserves, also attended.
Mike Thornton of Houston, who served as a Navy SEAL in
Vietnam, said at the funeral, "He was just one of the guys,
and that's the way he liked it."
Thornton quoted from the book, "These Good Men," by Marine
Infantry Capt. Michael Norman:
"I know now why men who have been to war reunite, to be with
men who once acted their best ... stripped raw, down to
their humanity ... I've never given men so much trust."
Ledbetter said Clausen flew 1,960 combat missions in
Vietnam.
"He had done this over and over," Ledbetter said. "How can
you be surprised at what he did? God called him home; he
needed a crew chief."
Several men wore uniforms from the Vietnam War era.
Ed "Grizzly" Smiley of Baton Rogue, a former Marine
infantryman, wore civilian clothes and had long hair and a
beard reaching his chest.
"Mike ... told me he was in trouble half the time, but he
was the best," Smiley said.
Matt Templar of Independence said Clausen "didn't get his
(private first class) stripe back until after he won the
Medal of Honor. He was humble, but blunt."
"I remember one night we were in a bar, and there was some
guy with a fake Medal of Honor who was bragging," Templar
said. "Mike knew he shouldn't be wearing it in a bar, and
then after talking to him a minute, realized it was fake. He
took him outside and left him there."
The consensus of those at the reception who knew Clausen was
that he was not a poster boy for the U.S. Marine Corps or
much of a parade-day Marine. To a man, they said they did or
would have gladly trusted him with their lives.
Rick Lottie, a Vietnam Marine helicopter veteran, said, "He
was humorously irreverent, but deeply respectful."
Clausen worked as an inspector for Boeing Aircraft after he
returned from Vietnam. After losing an eye and suffering
life-threatening injuries in a car wreck, Clausen retired.
His wife, Lois, said injuries from that wreck kept them from
having children. She was with him when he died in a Dallas
hospital.
License plates on cars in the funeral procession stretching
for more than a mile from St. Joseph Catholic Church to the
Ponchatoula City Cemetery included Idaho and California.
Johnice Daniel of the Red Wing American Indian Teaching
Center in Husser circled Clausen's casket after the formal
ceremonies, tapping the sides with a handful of feathers.
"The seven eagle feathers have been passed down for three
generations. They go back to the 1970s," she said.
She said the ceremony is done for heroes, "fallen warriors,
who defended our culture and our land."
The Rev. Justin Kauchak of St. Joseph's, said at the church
service, "He served the Lord in his own way and fit the
definition of a just man."
Deacon Linwood Liner, who shared officiating with Kauchak,
said he had known Clausen for 25 years.
"Our Savior reached down from Heaven and said, 'Mike, it's
time,'" Liner said. "Imagine the scene: Mike arrives at the
Pearly Gates, knocks and hears a voice, 'Who goes there?'
'Pfc. Raymond Mike Clausen Jr.' he replies. 'Enter, the
Father says, welcome home.'"
With Clausen's passing, Louisiana has lost two of its three
living Medal of Honor recipients in the past eight months.
Edward Schowalter Jr., a native of New Orleans, was awarded
the Medal of Honor for his actions during the Korean War.
Schowalter, who died on Nov. 21, was the first lieutenant in
command of Company A, 31st Regiment, 7th Infantry Division.
On Oct. 14, 1952, near Kumhwa, Korea, Schowalter was leading
an attack when his 1st Platoon came under heavy small-arms
and mortar fire 50 yards from the objective, according to
his Medal of Honor citation.
Despite being wounded by a grenade, Schowalter rallied led
his company and led it into the enemy trenches before he was
wounded again. He refused to be evacuated until the position
was secured.
Louisiana's only living Medal of Honor recipient is
Jefferson Deblanc, a native of Lockport, who received the
award for his actions in World War II.
Deblanc was a captain with Marine Fighting Squadron 112 in
the Pacific Theater.
According to his citation, on Jan. 31, 1943, Deblanc's
squadron was flying cover for a group of dive bombers and
torpedo planes when they attacked a group of Japanese Zeros
trying to attack the bombers.
Deblanc helped stop the attack and later downed two Zeroes
even though his low fuel later forced him to parachute on an
enemy-held island.