On March 29, 1973, the last U.S. combat troops left South Vietnam (some advisers and others remained), ending the United States' direct military involvement in a war that didn't officially end until 1975.

Even a half-century after the end of the Vietnam War, Stephen Rosedale still remembers what it felt like trudging through rice paddies with his fellow U.S. soldiers in oppressive heat and humidity, slogging through thigh-high mud as leeches crawled up their legs.