When I was a kid growing up in fear of nuclear devestation, I used to think that Vietnam footage was ancient (since they were using guns, grenades, etc and NOT nukes). I could not grasp the fact when my dad told me that Vietnam was only a few years before I was born and not around 1930.

Pablo

I used to think World War I and II were actually pronounced War War I and II.

Took me about 11-12 years to get it straight.

Holly

i was about 10, before the Gulf War started and i remeber hearing about it all the time. i also remeber watching endless hours of it ontelevision. However, i thought i was all about GOLF. i couldnt figure out why people would fight so much about Golf.

Zo

I was like five and a half during desert storm, and I didn't quite get how we could be at war if there were no soldiers in army greens tearing through our neighborhood (like in mash) or fighter planes in the sky (like in topgun). Even though I had a very very dim view of what was going on I still would watch the news and it wasnt until about three years ago that I realized that the guy I believed was george Bush snr when I was little was actually donald rumsfeld.

child of the 80's

up until i was like 17 i thought that POW/MIA was a band because everyone had their teeshirts and stickers.

Rain

Until about the NINTH grade, I believed that the Gulf War happened in the Gulf of Mexico, because until then, I hadn't learned about any other gulfs, and hadn't actually thought it out to see my error...

The Ditz

I used to believe that the Koreans from the Korean War were big green monsters that I'd probably seen in a comic book that my brother had.

Rose

When I was little the gulf war was constantly on TV. I can remember looking at all the tanks and explosions thinking they were taking their game of golf a bit too far! It wasnt until many years later I figured out what it was really about!

Anon

My Dad did this one, when I was a little girl I used to ask my Dad what happened to his fingernails to make them so short and ugly he told me that he had fought in the Indian Wars in the 1800's and that the Indians had cut his fingernail off with a tomahawk. (My Dad used to make us watch John Wayne movies all the time so this seemed like somewhat plausible) For years I believed this cause why would my Daddy lie to me.. Then in school we were talking about the Indian Wars and me being me I had to open my big mouth luckily this was still in grade school so no one thought I was too crazy they just told my Dad to stop telling me stories like that.

Michelle

For a while I refused to go to the drive-in movie theater because I had the idea that wars took place in theaters. (Must have heard something about the various "theaters" in WWII!)

ockham

When the Gulf War was on, back in 1991, I thought it would be like World War II, and the Iraqis would come over and bomb us, and I remember once waking up at 2am and was scared to go back to sleep incase we got bombed.

padfoot

Before I was old enough to understand the terminology behind the phrase "World War", all I saw was an image of the entire globe covered in people fighting each other. It just seems a little bit weird to see two soliders trying to shoot each other off the very highest peak of Mount Everest. Stranger still, I though that World War I was the first round of the fight, and that World War II was the second half. A bit like a football match, only with more violence.

Confused

When I was 7 years old I heard a news report about the Vietmnm cease fire, and I thought the reporter said "Sea Spyer" and I thought that the "Sea Spyer" was a secret agent on a ship.

Charlie

My grandparents built a bombshelter in their garden during the 2nd World War.When I was a child, I was terrified of it, because I believed that there were rotten remains of dead soldiers from the war in there.I do not where I got the idea from.My grandparents actually never used the shelter for anything else, but to store their jars of homemade jam.

L

Based on a line in the Star-Spangled Banner, I used to think that wars were fought by each side firing cannons at one another's flags. Whoever's flag was obliterated first was the loser. That's why Francis Scott Key was so happy that his flag was still there in the morning.

Andrea

When I was very young, probably about six or so, my father told my younger sister and I that he had been a Ranger in Vietnam. Until I was in my second year in college, I had this mental image that he was one of the people that made sure that the two sides “played nice” and that he made sure that the animals in the jungle weren’t hurt.

It was a bit of a shock to finally figure it out...

- Saint

I used to love studying the Civil War ( I still do ) since I was in 1st grade. Well, I told my friend about it. We both were in 2nd grade. Well, I told him that to win a battle, you had to take the enemies' flag, as they took the enemies' colors in the Civil War. Whenever we played war, we always "took the enemies' flag". I guess that's how capture the flag came to be.

UJL