From: Paintball Plus (pball@csionline.net)
Date: Mon Feb 10 2003 - 15:00:50 PST
Mer Mites - short for "Merry Mites." This was the first platoon of
"midgets" ever in the armed forces. These soldiers, all under 5'4" were
recruited for one specific purpose during the Vietnam war. They were
employed as "tunnel rats," as they were able to fit in the tunnels that
the Asian size military could crawl through, but the Americans could not
because of their much larger size. The average life expectancy for any
Mer Mite was only about 6 months in country, due to the very nature of
their mission. Soldiers would often write in waterproof ink on their
butts the day they went into service as a Mermite. Hence the practice of
"dating the mermite can."
Bruce :-)
l51940@aol.com wrote:
>Thanks for all the MITEE good replys to my question. I still think that I don't know what Mermite is! DJ McConnell
>
>
-- Bruce Kalin The Largest Historic Military Vehicle Convoy in US History http://www.trackpads.com/webs/bkalin/convoy.html
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