Cunningham, Keith

Keith Cunningham was born February 11, 1950 in London, Ontario.  He spent his early years on a farm in the Bruce Peninsula, where he did a lot of hunting in the northern Ontario wilderness. Keith attended school in that area too, where he was raised by his grandparents – he graduated in 1968. His mother had headed to the U.S. during this time, and Keith made the decision to head south too.  All the while he was aware of the Vietnam War, and the military tradition in his family was pulling him in that direction.  Keith wanted to join the USAF,as but they required a degree, so he gave community college a try before deciding to drop out after a year; that decision erased his ambitions to join the air force – and it brought him to the attention of the local draft board as by that time Keith had a green card.  He reported for induction and was soon headed to Fort Knox.  Training stints at Fort Polk and Fort Benning followed, and along the way Keith attended the Jump and Ranger Schools, as he was looking to enter one of the US military’s elite units.  Keith succeeded there and was promoted to sergeant, and then he was sent home on leave before heading to Fort Dix and Vietnam in 1971.  Once in Vietnam – and having acclimated to the heat and smell – Keith completed additional training at Chu Lai, including sniper school.  The time to go into the field came next, and Keith began the first of his 37 patrols, missions that could last anywhere from a few hours to thirty days.  Keith and the other Rangers were involved in long range patrols (LRP) missions, where they would be on the lookout for the NVA or Vietcong. The war was winding down by this time, with the policy of Vietnamization in full effect. Keith’s DEROS was consequently pushed up by 60 days, and then 120 – but Keith’s unit had been assigned a patrol, and he felt duty-bound to accompany his fellow soldiers one last time.  That proved to be a very fateful decision; they were dropped at a fire base and on the hunt for nearby NVA who had been attacking that base.  Following difficult jungle terrain, Keith and his men were victims of “friendly fire” as an American gunship mistakenly targeted the valley they were patrolling, killing one soldier and wounding five others.  Keith’s service in Vietnam finished shortly after that incident, and he returned to the US and used his GI Bill benefits to take a gunsmithing course.  The allure of the military was still there for him though, so he headed north to Canada and enlisted in the Canadian Forces, where he became an infantry officer and made a career in the Royal Canadian Regiment.  Along the way he was a peacekeeper in Cyprus, as well as being deployed with NATO contingents in Germany and Norway.  Keith was also a renowned marksman during his time in the Canadian military, earning many honours and awards.  He was interviewed by Scott Masters at his home in Minden, Ontario in August 2025.