When I got put after just short of 8 years (I absorbed almost 3 months when I re-enlisted) I had 2 ribbons on my dress blues - the National Defense Service Medal (everybody got that on completing the first day of Boot Camp) and a Good Conduct Medal (4 years without trouble, under current rules, that is now 3 years). Because I was aboard the USS Enterprise when Saigon fell at the end of April 1974 (we had actually been scheduled to leave for the States a couple of weeks earlier, but we were called back for one more South China Sea tour) and participated in the evacuation process known as Frequent Wind for which all participants were awarded a Navy Unit Commendation, either a Vietnam Service Medal or an Armed Forces Expeditionary Medal at the recipient's choice, and a Humanitarian Service Medal. I transferred out of the F-14 squadron VF1 less than a year after we returned to NAS Miramar and soon after (Nov 1976) discharged at the end of my enlistment (I volunteered to stay in the Reserves for another two years) before all the bureaucratic paperwork was completed, so the medals never caught up to me. On top of that, since the NDSM active period had ended in 1973 with the Paris cease-fire agreement, the Navy created the Sea Service Deployment Ribbon (90 days at sea) in 1980 and backdated the eligibility date to 1973. There is another semi-official medal in the works - the Cold War Victory Medal (any service between 1946 and 1989) which has been designed and has been stuck in Congressional Committees for years. It's official enough that the National Guard in 2 states (Alaska and Louisiana) have awarded them so they are available for purchase.
