Back at Jew: Changing My Dog tags Back After Almost 50 Years

My first and current dog tags. Bottom line is JEWISH.

In February 1972, I got my first set of dog tags at Basic Training.  Most people never change their dog tags.  The information on them: 

Name,

Service Number,

Blood Type,

Religion

This information does not change for most people. In fact, most soldiers could go to their grave with their original set of dog tags around their neck, whether they die on the battlefield at 19 or they die reliving one last memory at 99.

I am on my fourth set of dog tags.

In 1972, in addition to my name, service number and blood type, the two stamped metal tags identified me as Jewish.  At the time, I knew I was Jewish in some sense, not so much in others.

I was born in Beth Israel Hospital in Boston, the son of a Jewish veteran of World War II. He was the fourth of six sons of Hyman and Esther Gussman. They escaped the pogroms in Odessa, Russia, in 1900 and came to America.  My mother was not Jewish. So to some Jews, I’m not Jewish—a Jewish mother makes a Jew.

To most gentiles, I’m definitely a Jew. I was Jewish enough to get called a Kike once in a while as a kid and to get beaten up in the fifth grade by some Catholic boys who told me I killed Jesus.  I didn’t remember killing Jesus, but they insisted with their fists. 

At age 13, I had a Bar Mitzvah, but the six months before the ceremony and the day of the ceremony were the only times I was in the Synagogue in my very secular life.

By the time I was 18 and on the way to basic training, I was vaguely agnostic.  I knew nothing of the Holocaust at the time, my family did not talk about it, so I did not realize I was Jewish enough to be sent to Auschwitz. For that I needed only one Jewish grandparent. I had two. As a matter of fact, I had no idea I could had the “Right of Return” to Israel.  If you are Jewish enough for a Nazi to kill you, you are Jewish enough for Israel to accept you.

The next year I thought about faith for the first time as I recovered from a missile explosion that left me blind and with other injuries.  I believed in God before I got my sight back. I started going to a Baptist Church in Utah near the base where I was stationed.  In 1974, my sight restored, I left the Air Force. 

In 1975, I decided to re-enlist in the Army. I got new dog tags.  All the information was the same except the last line said Christian. 

I kept those dog tags until 1984 when I got out, thinking I was done with the military.

Then in 2007, I re-enlisted. I got new dog tags. This time the last line of my dog tags said Presbyterian.  Not that the difference mattered much.  Dog tags are used to identify your body if you are dead, or to know what kind of blood you need or which chaplain should be called to your bedside if you are unable to talk. At the time of my enlistment I was a member of a Presbyterian Church, so that was the “bottom line” of my dog tags.

In 2013, I re-enlisted again. This time, I was going to deploy to Afghanistan with an Infantry Brigade. The deployment was cancelled. In 2014, after the deployment to Afghanistan was cancelled, I started planning a bicycle trip across Russia.  The trip was supposed to be a ride to memorialize my grandfather’s nine-month trek north from Odessa to Finland to escape the Tsar’s Army.

I wore the Presbyterian dog tags until I got out for the last time in May of 2016.  Later that year, Trump got elected President and put white nationalist Steve Bannon in the White House. Racism and anti-Semitism suddenly had a Presidential Seal, so I switched the trip to visiting Holocaust sites and memorials.

The Star of David worn by German Jews under the Nazis

I started feeling Jewish.  And I was feeling betrayed. The country I defended, that I fought for elected an open racist, proud racist. After an entire life of being a soldier and never protesting, I started protesting every week.

The next summer, in 2017, I rode a bicycle from Belgrade, Serbia, to Lviv, Ukraine, visiting Holocaust sites and memorials.  Then I went to Germany, France and Israel, visiting more Concentration Camps and Holocaust Memorials. 

Nazis and racists with rebel flags 

marching together in Charlottesville, Va.

I came back home in July. In August, Nazis marched in Charlottesville, chanting “Blood and Soil” at night, then murdering and maiming the next day.  In the following week, the U.S. President was unable to condemn Nazis.   

After Charlottesville, I was adrift spiritually.  In December of 2017, I started attending a local Synagogue.  Here is the story of how I got to the Synagogue.

This year, I made more changes in my life. I started doing Yoga; I meditate; I go to weekly prayer and Torah Study at the Synagogue, most recently I started keeping a thankfulness journal along with meditation.

In July, I rode to Boston to attend a picnic. I started listening to a podcast about the founding of Israel. In July, I got a new set of dog tags. They are easy to buy on line. Like my first set of dog tags, the dog tags I wear now say JEWISH (Dog tags are stamped in ALL CAPS).

After the shooting in Pittsburgh, I followed news reports closely until I heard why the gunman attacked the Synagogue.  The shooting was in the morning. By 3pm I knew in the words of the murderer why he did it. He believed the lie Trump was telling about the caravan being an invasion force. Trump’s lie led the angry racist in Pittsburgh to commit murder.

And yet, that same evening and every day after until the election, Trump kept telling the same lie at his Hillbilly Nuremberg rallies.

My dog tags reflect something of who I was and am, but dog tags have no nuance.  The 1972 dog tags were an answer to a question by a supply clerk:  “Religion?” They did not reflect my discomfort with being Jewish and how happy I was to just be another soldier.

My current dog tags are still just stamped metal. They simply hang on a chain. They look the same as in the 1970s, but now they I want to be identified with others like me: Jews who could be attacked at any time for who we are and what we believe.

-->