Western-Star.com

Oliver North has spent countless hours with United States troops while filming War Stories, his show on Fox News.

Now the retired lieutenant colonel wants the nation to know what he's learned about those troops.

"I hang around with heroes," North said Sunday night, May 4, of men and women he's met who serve in Iraq, Afghanistan and the Philippines. "They're putting themselves at risk for us — extraordinary risk."

North's involvement in the Iran Contra Affair during the Reagan Administration may have made him a controversial figure in U.S. politics, but he found a receptive audience when he stopped to promote his new book, American Heroes, at a packed Grace Baptist Church in Middletown Sunday night.

Ron Dotson, of Middletown, is a frequent viewer of North's show and said he appreciates the perspective North brings to coverage of the war.

"I like Oliver North was a corpsman with the Marines in Vietnam," Dotson said. "You can't really explain combat unless you've experienced it."

North praised the troops he's met as the brightest, best-trained and best-educated in the history of not just the U.S., but the entire world.

"They're remarkable men and women of extraordinary faith," he said. And he criticized the media for not understanding the troops' motivations.

As an example, he recalled a Navy medical corpsman who risked his life to save an Iraqi Republican Guard soldier. A reporter from a news agency taunted the man for putting himself at risk to save the life of an enemy, North said.

"'Didn't you notice he was wounded?'" North said the corpsman replied. "'That's what we do. We're American.'"

Contact this reporter at (513) 705-2511 or dwells@coxohio.com.

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