Hal Moore
Harold Gregory Moore Jr. was a United States Army lieutenant general and author. As a lieutenant colonel, he commanded the 1st Battalion, 7th Cavalry Regiment, at the Battle of Ia Drang in 1965, during the Vietnam War. The battle was detailed in the 1992 bestseller We Were Soldiers Once…and Young, co-authored by Moore and made into the film We Were Soldiers in 2002, which starred Mel Gibson as Moore. Moore was the "honorary colonel" of the regiment. He was awarded the Distinguished Service Cross, the U.S. Army's second-highest decoration for valor, and was the first soldier in his West Point graduating class of 1945 to be promoted to brigadier general, major general, and lieutenant general.
Moore was awarded the Order of Saint Maurice by the National Infantry Association as well as the Distinguished Graduate Award by the West Point Association of Graduates.
Early life and education
Moore was born on February 13, 1922, in Bardstown, Kentucky, the eldest of four children born to Harold Sr. and Mary Moore. His father was an insurance agent whose territory covered western Kentucky. His mother was a homemaker. Because he was interested in obtaining an appointment to the U.S. Military Academy at West Point, New York, and felt his chances were better if he lived in a larger city, he left Kentucky at the age of seventeen before finishing high school and got a job in Washington, D.C., working in the U.S. Senate book warehouse.Moore finished high school at night while working days and graduated from St. Joseph Preparatory School in Bardstown with the class of 1940. Moore attended George Washington University at night for two years, working at his warehouse job while waiting on an appointment to West Point. During his time at George Washington University, he was a member of the Kappa Sigma fraternity.
After President Franklin D. Roosevelt signed legislation authorizing each senator and representative to make additional appointments to the military and naval academies, Moore was offered an appointment to the United States Naval Academy by Representative Ed Creal of the 4th Congressional District of Kentucky. Moore had no desire to go to the Naval Academy. Moore instead asked Creal whether he would be willing to trade his Naval Academy appointment to another congressman for an open Military Academy appointment for Moore, if Moore could find a willing partner for the exchange. Creal agreed, and Moore soon found Representative Eugene Cox of Georgia's 2nd Congressional District, who had an open appointment to West Point. Cox was impressed with Moore's tenacity and he left Cox's office with the West Point appointment.
Military service
West Point
Moore received his appointment to the U.S. Military Academy shortly after the United States entered into World War II. He reported to West Point for "Reception Day" on July 15, 1942, and the summer training referred to as "Beast Barracks" held before the formal academic school term took up in the fall. During his plebe summer at Pine Camp, he qualified as an expert on the M-1 Garand rifle and was the top scorer in his company. Although Moore did well in most of his classes, he was academically deficient in the required math subjects and he had to redouble his efforts to absorb the engineering, physics and chemistry, often studying two or three hours past lights out to memorize the material.In the fall of 1942, his class received the news that because of the war, his class would graduate in three years rather than the usual four years. Moore made it through the plebe year, but just barely, as he put it, it was "an academic trip from hell." This observation caused Moore to lead a student's life at West Point devoted to studying, with few extracurricular activities. After a ten-day furlough, he reported to Camp Popolopen for summer military training, where his company trained with vehicles and fired many types of weapons. The summer ended with maneuvers held again at Pine Camp.
In his second year at the academy, he studied more complicated subjects like calculus, electrical engineering, thermodynamics and historic military campaigns. Wednesdays were spent watching the latest Staff Combat Film Report, which reported the most recent fighting from the Pacific and European war fronts. Summer military training after his second year consisted of touring U.S. Army basic training centers to study tactics and techniques.
His final academic year was spent studying military history and tactics as the war was winding down in Europe. Just before graduation, each cadet selected his branch of assignment, dependent upon their academic standing in the class and the quota of openings in each branch. Moore was in the bottom fifteen percent and he wanted an infantry assignment. When his name was finally called to declare, there were still infantry openings available. Moore graduated from West Point on June 5, 1945, and he was commissioned as a second lieutenant in the infantry branch.
After World War II
Moore's first assignment after graduation was the Infantry Officer Basic Course at Fort Benning, Georgia, which was a six-week course. During the basic course he applied for the airborne jump school at Fort Benning. He was not selected, and was instead assigned to the three-week jump school held at the 11th Airborne Division in Tokyo, Japan. His first assignment out of jump school was with the 187th Glider Infantry Regiment at Camp Crawford near Sapporo, Japan from 1945 until 1948.After seven months as company commander, he was assigned as Camp Crawford's construction officer and responsible for all of the construction improvements being made at the camp. In June 1948, he was reassigned to the 82nd Airborne Division, at Fort Bragg. He volunteered to join the Airborne Test Section, a special unit testing experimental parachutes. In November 1948, he made the first of some 150 jumps with the section over the next two years. Over the course of his career, he became a jumpmaster, with over 300 jumps.
Korean War
In 1951, amidst the Korean War, he was ordered to Fort Benning to attend the Infantry Officer's Advanced Course, which would prepare him to command a company or to serve on a battalion staff. In June 1952, Moore was assigned to the 17th Infantry Regiment of the 7th Infantry Division. As a captain, he commanded a heavy mortar company in combat. He next served as regimental Assistant Chief-of-Staff, Operations and Plans. Moore's promotion to major was put on hold by a policy of the 7th Division commanding general, that stated that no promotion to major would be possible without command of an infantry company in combat. The division commander personally assigned Moore to an infantry company so that Moore could be promoted to major, and thus later become divisional assistant chief-of staff for operations.Return to the United States
In 1954, Moore returned to West Point and served for three years as an instructor in infantry tactics. While serving as an instructor, Moore taught then-Cadet Norman Schwarzkopf, who called Moore one of his "heroes," and cites Moore as the reason he chose the infantry branch upon graduation. During this assignment, Moore took a personal interest in the battles between the French Army forces and the Việt Minh at Điện Biên Phủ in Vietnam.In 1956, Moore was assigned to attend the year-long student course at the Command and General Staff College at Fort Leavenworth, Kansas. The course prepared majors for the duties of staff officers at the division and corps level. After study at Fort Leavenworth, Moore reported to the Pentagon and the Office, Chief of Research and Development where his initiative and insights were key to the development of new airborne equipment and airborne/air assault tactics. In 1960, following graduation from the Armed Forces Staff College at Norfolk, Virginia, Moore served a three-year tour as NATO Plans Officer with Headquarters, Allied Forces Northern Europe in Oslo, Norway.
In 1964, now a lieutenant colonel, Moore completed the course of study at the National War College, while earning a master's degree in International Relations from George Washington University in Washington, DC. Moore was transferred to Fort Benning and commanded 2nd Battalion, 23rd Infantry later to become a part of 11th Air Assault Division, undergoing air assault and air mobility training and tests. On July 28, 1965, President Lyndon Johnson announced that he was sending "the Airmobile Division to Vietnam".
In July, the 11th Air Assault Division was re-designated the 1st Cavalry Division and alerted for deployment to Vietnam. Moore's battalion was re-designated as 1st Battalion, 7th Cavalry Regiment, 1st Cavalry Division, the same regiment that was under the command of Lieutenant Colonel George Custer when the Irish song Garry Owen was adopted as a marching tune. The "Garry Owen" Brigade left Fort Benning August 14, 1965, and went to South Vietnam by way of the Panama Canal aboard USNS General Maurice Rose, arriving at the Division's An Khê Base Camp a month later.
Vietnam War
Beginning on November 14, 1965, Lt. Col. Moore led the 1st Battalion, 7th Cavalry of the 3rd Brigade, 1st Cavalry Division in the week-long Battle of Ia Drang. Encircled by enemy soldiers with no clear landing zone that would allow them to leave, Moore managed to persevere despite being significantly outnumbered by North Vietnamese Army forces that engaged the 2nd Battalion, 7th Cavalry, only two-and-a-half miles away the next day. Moore's dictum that "there is always one more thing you can do to increase your odds of success" and the courage of his entire command are credited by Moore with this outcome.Moore was wounded and earned a Purple Heart. Because the wound wasn't serious, he did not believe he was entitled to the medal, and unsuccessfully tried to return it. He never wore the ribbon or the medal on his uniform. The blond haired Moore was known as "Yellow Hair" to his troops at the battle at Ia Drang, also a tongue-in-cheek homage referencing the legendary General George Armstrong Custer, who commanded as a lieutenant colonel the same 7th Cavalry Regiment at the Battle of the Little Bighorn just under a century before. Moore was awarded the Distinguished Service Cross for extraordinary heroism at Ia Drang. After the Battle of the Ia Drang Valley, Moore was promoted to colonel and took over the command of the Garry Owen Brigade.