Wow, interesting story about SFC Cszenigy. Hard to believe we fought against him in WWII and then he later worked with us in Vietnam. Definitely a career soldier and pretty rare to be involved in that many conflicts over such a long period (and be around to talk about it). So was he then a US tank commander in Vietnam? Curious about his story on why and what ever happened to him.

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Wow, interesting story about SFC Cszenigy. Hard to believe we fought against him in WWII and then he later worked with us in Vietnam. Definitely a career soldier and pretty rare to be involved in that many conflicts over such a long period (and be around to talk about it). So was he then a US tank commander in Vietnam? Curious about his story on why and what ever happened to him.

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Bryan,
Sadly I don't know what happened to SFC Cszenigy after I left the 2/11 ACR in 1980, but I suspect he's gone by now. The more I think about it-- I think he was actually Hungarian, not Czech-- and had been in the Hungarian Army post WWII--it was 39 years ago for me. He was a SFC platoon Sergeant at the time I knew him in 2nd Plt, F troop, 2/11 ACR. I was the 3rd Plt Ldr. in the Platoon next door to his. He'd been in various Cav units, but I think he was in both the 1st Cav and 11th Cav in Vietnam as a tanker. He was tall--and lanky, very physically fit, but chain smoked Camels. He said he was drafted into the Wehrmacht at age 17, sometime in 1942, and learned to drive Panzer IVs, and Panthers as I recall. He had the "opportunity" to surrender sometime in late 1944, so he spent a year in a British POW camp in England, was repatriated to East Europe after the war, and was immediately drafted into the Hungarian or Czech Army, I cant remember which) to serve his "penance" for being in the Whermacht, as he used to say. Sometime in the early 50s he saw how communism was going for east Europe, so he "illegally" emigrated to France one night. The French, being a practical people, gave him a choice-- go back to East Europe, (where they knew he would be shot as a deserter), or join the FFL-- so he ended up in Algeria and then Vietnam. The French gave successful Legionnaires the opportunity to become French citizens after service, but after a couple of years of unsuccessful civilian life as a mechanic, he emigrated to the US, where he promptly enlisted in the US Army, went back to Vietnam for a couple of tours in the 60s, and stayed in the Army. When I knew him, he was close to 20 years of US service, had married a German woman, and planned to retire in Germany. He used to tell us stories about how cold it would get as a German conscript, and during the summer of 1944, how they took to painting the panzers with brooms and mops since the "jabos' were constantly a threat. He used to call us "wimps" in his thick east European accent-- but he had the respect of everybody in the Squadron-- and really was the toughest guy physically and mentally I've ever known. He used to chum around with our WWII veteran 1SG, who had fought in the Battle of the Bulge. It was truly an honor to be a snot-nosed 2LT and serve with these guys-- I'm sure we really were wimps in their eyes, but they tried to teach us to survive. Cszenigy also spoke 4 languages fluently-- Hungarian (That's why I think he was originally Hungarian), German, French, English and could speak some pretty good Russian too. I had an incredibly interesting 30 year career-- and he was just one of many "characters" and personalities I've had the privilege to meet and serve with along the way.
VR, Russ