LEWISTON – Bob Gelinas heads a family of three-generation war veterans, but he describes himself as anti-war.

The 83-year-old says he has a right to hold that opinion and to express it: “I fought for that right.”

He fought from 1943 to 1945 in World War II, including the Battle of the Bulge.

In 1968 his son, Richard Gelinas, joined the U.S. Air Force and served in Vietnam.

In 2004 his grandson, Matthew Wheeler, did a tour in Iraq with the U.S. Army.

The family patriarch didn’t encourage them to join the military. They joined in part to earn money for college, he said.

And when they get together, they don’t share war stories.

“You hear laughter. That’s the way I want it. We don’t talk politics. They have their own opinion; I have mine. That’s fine. That’s what we fought for.”

Bob Gelinas’ opinions include a thumbs-up for actress Jane Fonda – “If it wasn’t for people like Jane Fonda, we’d still be in Vietnam” – and a thumbs-down for President George W. Bush.

“We didn’t learn our lesson in Vietnam and now we have to relearn it in Iraq. I don’t care what George Bush says. We have no business there.”

For Gelinas, war is unnecessary. “There’s other ways of doing things. We are trying to rule the world with a gun.”

He was “dead-set against” his son Richard going to Vietnam in 1968.

“I didn’t like it,” Bob said, recounting that his son spent two years in Southeast Asia, one year in Thailand and one year in Vietnam. Gelinas said it was hard on his wife and himself. “It was the longest year we ever had.”

He was relieved when his son Roger, who had joined the Air Force, wasn’t sent to Vietnam but served at a base in California.

However, a generation later, his grandson joined the Army and was deployed to Iraq in 2004. Matthew Wheeler served with the 4th Infantry Division. To his grandfather’s relief, Wheeler came home with no wounds.

Despite his strong anti-war feelings, Gelinas believes U.S. involvement in World War II was necessary.

“We were right. We had to get involved. Fifty million were killed, but there would have been a lot more if we hadn’t stopped them.”

A bloody battlefield

In 1943 Gelinas was working at a grocery store, helping to support his family. He was one of 13 children. When he was 19, his father died. Two weeks later, Bob was drafted.

A medic with the 9th Army, in November 1944 he went into combat in Germany and Belgium. He was in the Battle of the Bulge, one of the bloodiest engagements in the war. His job was to drive a Jeep from the supply houses to the battalion stations with medical supplies so they could treat the wounded.

He and the lieutenant he drove wore helmets with red crosses. That didn’t protect them from being shot at by German planes.

“If you’re in a convoy with tanks and trucks, they’ll shoot at you,” Gelinas said.

He quickly learned to recognize the sound of enemy planes. “A British Typhoon doesn’t sound like a Spitfire. A P-47 doesn’t sound like a P-51, or a P-38. And a German Messerschmit doesn’t sound like any of those.”

Before the shooting started, Gelinas and his lieutenant would scramble out of the Jeep to find cover. A couple of their Jeeps were destroyed, but he was never hit. “I’m lucky to be alive.”

The last phase of the war was bad, he said. “We lost over 20,000 men in the Battle of the Bulge within two weeks.”

Another time, he thought his life was over when he was driving his lieutenant in Holland when they got stopped at a roadblock. “It was pitch-black. These guys were armed to the teeth.”

One put a gun to Gelinas’ head and asked, “Who won the World Series?” It was a situation where “You better come up with the right answer, or goodbye,” Gelinas said. He was not a baseball fan but other soldiers had talked about it, so he knew that the St. Louis Cardinals won over the St. Louis Browns. It turned out to be an American roadblock with soldiers checking to make sure he and his lieutenant were not Germans posing as Americans, Gelinas said.

Warfare, then and now

He believes his war experiences were far different from what soldiers face today.

After American troops went through France and Germany, there were no insurgents. “Once we captured a town or city, it was clear. There was no more fighting. It’s not like that with Iraq.”

Another difference is that in World War II soldiers had no idea when they were coming home. For some it was two years; for others, five. Today, soldiers usually know before they leave.

That makes a big difference emotionally, Gelinas said.

World War II soldiers not only didn’t know when they’d come home, they also knew little about where they were going and what they’d be doing.

As Gelinas was on a ship crossing the Atlantic in 1944, “Everybody was wondering where we’d be going.” They heard about the Normandy Invasion on the radio. “Everybody said, ‘Now we know where we’re going.'” But there was no room in France. They went to England before moving on to France, Belgium, Holland and Germany.

The soldiers didn’t have calendars or cameras or any way to keep records, Gelinas said. Sometimes he can’t believe he was there and it feels like a bad dream, but the experience made him realize how lucky he was to be alive.

After the war, he was awarded the Bronze Star for completing his mission of delivering “critical” medical supplies to the front lines. “Private First Class Gelinas made daily trips through perilous country and was constantly subjected to enemy shelling and aircraft strafing,” the citation reads.

Gelinas insists he’s no hero.

“I just did what I was told to do, just like everybody else did.”