Guerrilla fighters are really gorillas

I was born in 1958 in the US. During the sixties the Vietnam War was on and it affected my life in that I had older cousins and guys from the neighborhood go there to fight. Growing up on the staple of World War II movies and shows, I was fascinated, like every other young boy, by the war. In the evenings we would watch the nightly news and hear stories about the Viet Cong guerrillas fighting the American troops.

My best friend, Frank, and I were scared silly at the thought of armed and organized gorillas swinging through the trees carrying rifles and grenades and launching coordinated attacks against US troops. When we discussed it, is was with a sense of awe and terror that the world contained such animals. Of course, we were very curious as to why we never saw any of them on the news. I think we must have chalked it up to them being up in the trees.

I can't remember how old I was when I finally learned the difference between guerrilla and gorilla, but for a few years at least, I was terrified of apes.

Bob Natarelli

while watching the news with my father when i was around 6,the newsman said that "guerillas had shot some soldiers in the war in the african congo".for a long time after i used to believe that the gorilla ape was going around the congo with guns killing people.it was a great relief to finally realise my mix up.

noel leon

I was a kid during Vietnam and kept hearing about a guerilla war. I had no idea what a guerilla was, and a rough idea of war from tuig-of-war, and the card game War.

Then Planet of the Apes came out. I was petrified.

Robert

When They Spoke About Guerilla Wars
I Thought That "Gorillas" Had Guns And They Were Fighting With Humans For Their Freedom

VenkatSharma

The song goes Video killed the radio star, before we had TV the spoken word was magic.
And in a childs mind anything was possible.
After the war the radio was the magic box in the corner, among the best to open the imagination was a program called " Saturday night Theatre ".
In one play based on the war they spoke of the"Guerrlla" attacks.
It was quite some time after it was explained to me that they were not infact "Gorrila's"...

Peter

When I was about 3 years old, I would watch Planet of the Apes movies with my Uncle *a lot*.....
... Then one day I was terribly confused and horrified by the News reporting "Gorilla" warfare. I became terrified to go outside because I believed that it was REAL because the news reported it.
:)

Kimberly in AZ

I used to believe that the guerilla warfare I heard about on the TV news was actually being fought out by gorillas!

Snowy

When i was a kid I remember watching the news with my
dad and hearing "ravaging guerrias invading the middle east"
and thinking they were talking about gorrilas.i would wonder how they escaped the zoo.i had this image of hundreds of gorrilas stampeding all over the place!

Jennifer

I used to think that the Nicaraguans had trained gorillas to fight for them since it was always on the news about "guerilla warfare". It was the mid 80's and I was 10 or so. I had nightmares about killer gorillas for months.

Jena B

I can remember listening to the news when I was a kid and they would talk about gorilla fighting or gorilla warfare. I could never understand why the gorillas didnt' get along!

Anon

When I was about 6 or 7, durring the Grenada conflict, I was shocked to learn about guerilla warfare from the TV news. I didnt think that gorillas could even use guns, and I cried for hours thinking that we were shooting at the defenseless apes.

Ryan

I was convinced that Gorilla soldiers in Vietnam in the 70's were real Gorillas attacking other Soldiers.

Mario

When I was a kid and I heard on the news about geurilla action is some countries I used to think those countries were being overrun by gorillas. I used to have nightmares about them coming to my country.

Michael

When I was a child I would watch the evening television news with my parents. Whenever the newspeople would mention "Gorilla fighters", I remember thinking "Wow, those things are SMART!"

Eric

I was 10-12 years old in the mid-1960's during the Vietnam War and could not for the life of me figure out why the Viet Cong gorillas (guerillas) would shoot at American soldiers.

Mary

When i was ypoung I use to believe that the gorilla soilders out in the jungle were actually really groilla's fighting

Pjpug

I thought guerilla warfare was "gorilla warfare" in which they trained special army gorillas to fight using camoflage techniques to keep from being seen. Each country had its own army gorillas and when people wanted to be sneaky and not be in a real war, they would send out the secret gorilla troops to hide in the forests and shoot each other.

Whoever had the most gorillas left at the end of the battle won.

Lyssa

I used to believe that when the term guerilla warfare was mentioned, it was apes, monkeys, and gorillas fighting it out! They'd be out there, with rifles, guns etc. I thought it so odd....

Ellen

When I was young we would hear about the Gorillas fighting in South America against the armies on the radio and I always picture in my head armies of gorillas with helmets and guns fighting armies of people.

Steve