I was a kid living in Izmir, Turkey. My father was an AF MSgt assigned to 6ATAF, aka Disco Hit, a mountain fortress just outside of the city. My father came home and told us the Marines barracks in Beirut had just been bombed. We had only been in Turkey for 6 weeks. 241 Marines and other personnel we killed. Only few miles away, another suicide bomber hit the French barracks killing 58. We were put on lock down in our apartments and school was closed. At the Kordon Hotel, in downtown Izmir, where the American military used as billeting while waiting to find a place to live, they found a black Mercedes on blocks loaded with explosives. My friend Brain Hardenberg (whose dad was my fathers commander) and I had just walked past that very car a day before, and thought nothing of it. The reason I remember it, it was up on blocks and Brian and I wondered why someone would park a car in the alley on blocks and leave it. Imad Mughniyeh was the mastermind of the bombing and continued to plan more up until he died of car bombing this year. How ironic.
It was a sad day and I can't believe to took a newspaper article to remind me of what day it was.
RIP
S!