{"id":59450,"date":"2015-04-23T09:57:56","date_gmt":"2015-04-23T13:57:56","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/valorguardians.com\/blog\/?p=59450"},"modified":"2015-04-23T10:59:27","modified_gmt":"2015-04-23T14:59:27","slug":"anthony-kolat-phony-beirut-marine","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.azuse.cloud\/?p=59450","title":{"rendered":"Anthony Kolat; phony Beirut Marine"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"Anthony<\/a><\/center><\/p>\n

Scotty<\/a> sends us his work on this Anthony Kolat fellow<\/a> who claims that he was in Beirut when Hezbollah bombed the barracks there on October 23, 1983 and that he earned a Purple Heart there.<\/p>\n

\"Anthony<\/a><\/p>\n

\"Anthony<\/a><\/center><\/p>\n

Kolat, who was a combat engineer with the 1st Battalion, 8th Marines, 24th Marine Amphibious Unit, recalled being on a bulldozer and hearing sirens shortly after seeing and hearing the explosion. A Condition Red, the highest-alert level, was issued, and \u201call hell broke loose,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt was chaos. We couldn\u2019t leave our bulldozers until we had the all-clear four hours later,\u201d added Kolat, who arrived in Beirut in late September 1983 as part of a peacekeeping mission.<\/p>\n

Kolat shared many recollections Wednesday at the Eat \u2019n\u2019 Park Diner, South Avenue, Boardman. He also brought a Good Conduct certificate he was awarded, several photographs taken in Beirut after the bombing and various military artifacts that survived a fire at his residence shortly after he left the Marines in 1988.<\/p>\n

[…]<\/p>\n

Kolat said he received a Purple Heart for trying to find as many people as possible after the blast and ensuring no one was left behind.<\/p>\n

Nevertheless, Kolat continued, he was doing a job and doesn\u2019t consider himself a hero. The true heroes are those who made the ultimate sacrifice serving their country \u2014 including the 44 passengers and crew of United Flight 93 who fought four hijackers Sept. 11, 2001, before crashing near Shanksville, Pa.<\/p>\n

For a while after the attack on the barracks, Kolat said, he was able to deal with the memories. About seven years later, however, the past suddenly hit him, causing sleep problems, among other things, he said.<\/p>\n

Kolat, a 1978 North High School graduate, said he copes with the memories of that day through his faith as well as being a member of New Life Church in Poland.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Don’t worry, Mister Kolat, I don’t consider you a hero – especially since the Purple Heart isn’t awarded for meritorious service. But, hey, you’ve got that religion thing to hide behind. According to his records, Mister Kolat had left the active service a year and two months before the Marine Barracks were bombed in Beirut;<\/p>\n

\"Anthony<\/a><\/p>\n

\"Anthony<\/a><\/center><\/p>\n

Well, at least he didn’t invade Grenada after that. But, who knows, there’s still time to add another chapter.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Scotty sends us his work on this Anthony Kolat fellow who claims that he was in … Anthony Kolat; phony Beirut Marine<\/span>Read more<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":59453,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[30],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-59450","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-phony-soldiers"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.azuse.cloud\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/59450","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.azuse.cloud\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.azuse.cloud\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.azuse.cloud\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.azuse.cloud\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=59450"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.azuse.cloud\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/59450\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.azuse.cloud\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/59453"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.azuse.cloud\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=59450"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.azuse.cloud\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=59450"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.azuse.cloud\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=59450"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}