THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1994, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Friday, October 14, 1994 TAG: 9410140585
SECTION: FRONT PAGE: A18 EDITION: FINAL
SOURCE: BY DALE EISMAN, STAFF WRITER
LENGTH: Short : 38 lines
All three candidates in the Virginia U.S. Senate race are ex-Marines whose service included stints in combat in Vietnam.
Incumbent Charles S. Robb and Republican nominee Oliver L. North each had an extended and high-profile military career, including duty at the White House.
Independent candidate J. Marshall Coleman dropped out of the University of Virginia law school to enlist. He commanded troops as a lieutenant in Vietnam but returned to law school after completing his military obligation and says now he never intended to pursue a service career.
Robb got into the corps through the Marine ROTC at the University of Wisconsin, his alma mater. He was a major when he left active duty in 1970 and retired from the Marine reserve as a lieutenant colonel in 1991. While serving as part of the Marine honor guard in the White House in the mid-1960s, he courted and then married Lynda Bird Johnson, daughter of then-President Lyndon Johnson.
North began his military career at the Naval Academy. He did two tours of duty in Southeast Asia during the Vietnam War and worked his way up the ranks in a variety of jobs after the war. As a lieutenant colonel, North was assigned to the White House as an aide to the National Security Council during the Reagan administration. But in 1986, he was forced from the job over his role in engineering arms sales to Iran and funneling the profits to anti-communist rebels in Nicaragua. He retired from the Marines in 1988.
KEYWORDS: U.S. SENATE RACE VIRGINIA CANDIDATES MILITARY
RECORD by CNB