Questions to Ask a Veteran
Questions to ask a veteran about joining up, the job they did, daily life in uniform, coming home and how it all looks from here. They begin with the work and the people, which are easier ground than combat, and leave the harder subjects for the veteran to raise. Every question has a note on what to listen for or when to leave it alone. Students choosing questions to ask a veteran in an interview for school can take the first ten as they stand, and the full list suits family members and anyone recording an oral history. A handful are written as questions to ask war veterans in particular, and those stay with the orders, the letters home and the day it ended.
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The questions
Each question, and why to ask it
Start here
Which branch were you in, and what years?
Why ask it
A neutral opener that also gives you the context for everything else, since a posting in 1974 and one in 2014 have almost nothing in common. Dates often prompt the person to place themselves in a particular era rather than in the military generally.
What was your job, and how would you explain it to someone with no military background?
Why ask it
Most service is work rather than combat, and asking about the trade lets people talk about competence instead of trauma. Asking for the plain-language version tends to produce the best explanation they have, worn smooth by years of family dinners.
How did you end up joining?
Why ask it
Answers range widely: a recruiter at school, a family expectation, a draft, a need for a job, a plan for college. This is where you learn whether service was chosen, inherited or fallen into, which colours everything they say afterwards.
Where were you stationed, and which place do you still think about?
Why ask it
Places are easy to talk about and often fondly remembered: a town in Germany, a base in the desert, a port they saw for two days. The list of postings also maps their service for you, so you learn whether they went overseas without having to ask about deployments directly.
What do you remember most about basic training?
Why ask it
Basic training is one of the few things nearly everyone who served has in common, and the details usually come easily. Many will tell you the physical side was not the hard part, so listen for what was: tiredness, homesickness, or having every small decision made for them. If they call it boot camp or recruit training, use their word.
What did an ordinary Tuesday look like for you?
Why ask it
Inspections, watch rotations, maintenance and paperwork make up most of a military career and almost none of its public image. Asking for a Tuesday tells them you want their actual life and not a war story, and it works just as well for someone who never left their home base.
Who were you closest to, and are you still in touch?
Why ask it
Friendship is the part of service many veterans say they could not have found anywhere else. Be prepared for the answer to include someone who died, and if it does, let them decide how much to say next rather than steering away.
What is the best memory you have from your time in the service?
Why ask it
Asking for the best one tells a veteran you are not angling for the worst day. What comes back is often small, such as a sunrise from a flight deck, a football game in the mud or a hot meal after a week in the field, and it is worth asking who else was there.
How did serving change you?
Why ask it
Some will say it gave them discipline or confidence, some that it made them harder to live with for a while, and plenty will say both. If the reply is a single word, ask what the people who knew them beforehand would say was different.
What do you wish people asked you instead of what they usually ask?
Why ask it
This hands control of the conversation over, which is the point. The answer is often about wanting to be asked about the work, the friendships or their life since, rather than about combat.
Joining up
Why did you pick that branch over the others?
Why ask it
The reasons are seldom grand: a grandfather's photograph in a naval uniform, a wish to fly, a friend who had already signed, or the recruiter who returned the call. Leave it out for someone who was conscripted and had no say, or ask which branch they would have chosen.
What did your family say when you told them you were going in?
Why ask it
Pride, worry and a long silence at the dinner table can all come from the same household. Ask who took it hardest and whether that person had come round by the day they left for training.
What were you doing in the year before you went in?
Why ask it
School, a first job, a farm, a town they wanted out of: this puts a person in the picture before the uniform does. For an older relative it is often the stretch of their life the family has heard least about, so let it run.
Was anyone in your family in the service before you?
Why ask it
A father's or an aunt's service changes what joining meant, whether it was the expected thing or a break from everything the family knew. If the answer is yes, ask what that person told them beforehand and whether any of it turned out to be true.
How old were you when you went in, and how old did you feel?
Why ask it
The first half is a fact for the record and the second half is the story. Many people sign up in their late teens, and asking them to picture that kid brings out detail they would not volunteer about themselves now. It works especially well when the person asking is a student close to that age.
What do you remember about the day you left home?
Why ask it
Ask for the small things: who drove them, what they packed, the bus or the train, the haircut at the other end. Days like this are remembered in pictures rather than opinions, which makes it an easy question for someone who does not think of themselves as a storyteller.
What did you think it would be like, and how long did that idea last?
Why ask it
Most people arrived with a picture taken from films, a recruiter or an older brother, and can tell you the hour it fell apart. The gap between the two is usually funny, and it tells you what they were hoping the service would give them.
Was there a war on when you joined, and how much did that weigh on the decision?
Why ask it
For war veterans this is often where the story really begins, since some signed up because of the fighting and others in spite of it. Someone who served between conflicts can say so in a word, and you can move on without the question feeling wasted.
Did you choose your job, or did the service choose it for you?
Why ask it
Plenty of people asked for one trade and were handed another on the strength of a test score or a vacancy. Ask what they had wanted, because someone who spent four years in a job they never picked will describe the whole experience differently from someone who got their first choice.
Who from training do you still remember by name?
Why ask it
It is often an instructor, recalled decades later with a mixture of dread and respect, or the person in the next bunk. A name brings a face and a story with it, and if you are recording, ask them to spell it.
The work
Where did they send you first after training, and what was it like to arrive?
Why ask it
The first posting is where training stops and the job begins, and most people remember walking in as the newest person there. Ask who showed them how things were really done, which can bring up a name they have not said aloud in years.
What piece of equipment did you depend on most?
Why ask it
Frequently something mundane: a radio, a wrench, boots, a specific vehicle. Technical people especially will talk at length here, and the frustrations they mention say a lot about how their work was actually resourced.
Were you ever deployed, and what was a normal day like there?
Why ask it
Plenty of veterans never deployed, and a no is a complete answer that should never be met with disappointment. For those who did, asking about the normal day keeps you on heat, shifts, mail and boredom, and leaves anything heavier for them to bring up if they choose.
When did you learn you were being sent to a war zone, and who did you tell first?
Why ask it
The orders and the telephone call that followed are remembered closely, and they keep you on the days before leaving and away from what came after. Skip it if they have already said they never deployed.
How much of the war could you see from where you were?
Why ask it
A cook, a clerk, a mechanic and a rifleman in the same conflict saw four different wars, and many will say they knew less about its progress than people reading the papers back home. The wording lets someone far from the fighting answer as fully as someone close to it.
What was the hardest part of the job itself?
Why ask it
Anchoring the question on the job gives them a way to answer honestly without going near anything they would rather not discuss. Many people name separation from family, bad leadership or boredom rather than danger, which is worth hearing.
Was there a time you were scared, and what got you through it?
Why ask it
Children ask this outright, and it can be easier to answer for a child than for an adult. The fear a veteran picks may be a first parachute jump, a storm at sea or a furious instructor, so take the example you are given and do not fish for a bigger one.
What did you get good at that you did not expect to?
Why ask it
Answers tend toward the unglamorous and useful: improvising repairs, sleeping anywhere, briefing senior people, managing a crew of twenty at twenty-two years old. Ask whether they still use it, which carries the conversation from the service into the life they have had since.
What was the most responsibility you were ever handed, and how old were you?
Why ask it
The answer is often an aircraft, a night watch, a payroll or a dozen other people's safety, at an age when most civilians are trusted with very little. Ask how they were prepared for it and whether anyone checked their work, which is where the real description of the job comes out.
Who was the best leader you served under, and what did they do differently?
Why ask it
Asking for one person gets you a portrait instead of a theory of leadership. Listen for small habits, such as who ate last or who knew everyone's name, and ask whether they copied any of it once they were in charge of people themselves.
What was a job you were given that nobody had trained you for?
Why ask it
Most services run partly on people being told to work it out, so plenty of veterans have one of these: a broken generator, a ceremony to organise, a language they did not speak. The story shows how far the manual was from the day, and it is rarely a painful one.
What rank did you leave at, and which promotion meant the most to you?
Why ask it
The final rank belongs in any record, but the promotion that mattered is often an early one, the first time they were responsible for somebody else. Take the answer as it comes and do not compare it with anyone else's rank, including a relative's.
What part of your job no longer exists?
Why ask it
Trades, equipment and whole units get retired, and a veteran may be one of the few people left who can describe how a thing was really done. This makes them the expert in the room, and for an oral history it is the kind of detail that is hard to find written down anywhere.
What could you do then that you could not do now?
Why ask it
It usually gets a rueful laugh and a list: march all day with a pack, read Morse, strip an engine in the dark, sleep sitting up. The question lets an older veteran talk with pride about a skill or a younger body without the conversation turning to health.
Did you receive any medals or awards you would be willing to tell me about?
Why ask it
Some veterans will explain every ribbon and others will say they only did their job, so the wording leaves the door open either way. If they do answer, ask what the award is called and what it was given for in their own words, and do not assume it has anything to do with combat.
Daily life
What was the food like, and what was worth trading for?
Why ask it
Anyone who ate in a mess hall or out of a ration pack has an opinion about it, so this one rarely gets a short answer. The trading half tells you what was scarce where they were, whether that was hot sauce, instant coffee, dry socks or a turn on the telephone.
What did you miss most about home?
Why ask it
Expect something ordinary and exact: a mother's cooking, a dog, a bed with a door that shuts, a particular radio station. Ask whether it was the first thing they went back to, which gives you a ready way into the homecoming later on.
Where did you sleep, and how much space was your own?
Why ask it
The answer sets the scene for every other story they tell, whether it was a rack on a ship, an open barracks bay, a tent or a shared room off base. How little privacy there was, and what they did to carve some out, is something people tend to remember exactly.
How did you get news from home, and how long did it take to arrive?
Why ask it
Letters that took weeks, a queue for one telephone, email in a crowded tent and a video call every night are very different ways of being away. The answer dates their service better than the years do, and it leads naturally to who was writing to them.
What did you tell your family about where you were, and what did you leave out?
Why ask it
Word sent from a war zone was often edited twice, once by the rules and once by a writer who did not want a parent lying awake. Ask about the telling and take whatever they offer about the rest, because the gaps were left for a reason.
How did you spend a day off or a weekend pass?
Why ask it
These are the stories a veteran tends to tell with the least hesitation, and they remind you how young most of them were. If the answer is that they slept until noon, ask what there was for anyone with more energy: a sports league, a card game, a train to the nearest city.
What was it like to spend a holiday or a birthday away?
Why ask it
Units usually make something of the day, and people remember the cook who tried or the parcel that arrived a month late. It is also where homesickness comes up without your having to ask about it, so give the answer room.
What nickname did you have, and how did you get it?
Why ask it
Plenty of people had one and there is usually a story behind it, often at their own expense. If they laugh and decline to explain, take that as the answer and ask what other people in the unit were called instead.
Who was the character in your unit that everyone still tells stories about?
Why ask it
Most units had one: the schemer, the comedian, the one who could find anything. It is a safe way into stories about people, and it often produces names worth writing down in case a reunion or an old photograph comes up later.
Who did you serve with that you would never have met back home?
Why ask it
Service puts people from different regions, backgrounds and incomes in the same room, sometimes for the first time in their lives. Ask about one particular person and what the two of them learned from each other, which gets a better answer than asking what the experience taught them in general.
What did you keep with you that was personal?
Why ask it
A photograph, a letter folded small, a paperback, a religious medal, something from a younger sibling. The object tells you who they were holding on to, and many veterans still know exactly where it is, so ask whether you can see it.
Did you get to know any local people where you were posted?
Why ask it
The question treats a posting as somewhere they lived rather than somewhere they were sent. Answers tend to be about one person, such as a landlady, a shopkeeper or an interpreter, and if they served only in their own country you can ask about the town outside the base instead.
What song takes you straight back to those years?
Why ask it
Music places a person in an era faster than a date does, and many people can name the song at once. With an older relative, try playing it afterwards: it can bring out a story the question itself did not.
What is a story from your service that still makes you laugh?
Why ask it
Most veterans have one they have told many times and are happy to tell again, which makes this a good question for a child to ask. It is also worth keeping in reserve for a moment when the conversation has turned heavy and needs a way back.
Coming home
What was your first day back home like?
Why ask it
Ask who was waiting, what they ate first and how the house seemed after so long away. Receptions have differed a great deal from one era and one country to another, and some people came back to no welcome at all, so do not assume it was a happy day.
Where were you when you heard the war was over, or that your own part in it was?
Why ask it
Some wars end on a date everyone remembers and others simply stop for one person when a tour finishes, so the question allows for both. Relief is the answer you might expect, but people also describe feeling flat, or uneasy about the ones still out there.
What had changed at home while you were away?
Why ask it
It is a gentle way of asking how out of step they felt. They may start with prices and music and end on a younger brother suddenly grown or a relationship that had moved on without them, and from there it is a short step to how much they had changed in the eyes of the people at home.
How did you come to leave, and what was the first year out like?
Why ask it
Some finished a fixed term, some retired after a full career and some had the decision made for them, so ask before assuming it was a choice. The first year out is where many veterans have the most to say and are asked least: listen for whether they had a plan and how long it took before an ordinary day felt ordinary.
What was the hardest thing about going back to civilian life?
Why ask it
Veterans who found it hard tend to name the missing structure, workplaces where nobody says plainly what they want, or no longer belonging to a team that relied on them. Others will tell you it was no trouble at all, and that is an answer to believe rather than probe.
Did your skills translate to civilian work, or did you have to start over?
Why ask it
Whether military training counts toward a civilian licence or qualification depends on the trade and on where they settled, so a trained medic or mechanic may have walked straight into work or begun again at entry level. Ask which it was for them and what employers made of their record, and take their account over anything you have read about how it is supposed to work.
What did you do next, and how did you choose it?
Why ask it
For most veterans the service was a few years out of a long working life, and the rest of it deserves a question too. Notice whether they looked for something that resembled the military or went deliberately in the opposite direction.
Did you use any veterans' benefits, such as education or a home loan, and how did that go?
Why ask it
What is offered depends on the country, the era and the length and type of service, so ask what was available to them rather than assuming. In many families a degree or a first house traces back to this, and if the process was a struggle, listen without offering advice on claims.
What did people assume about you once they knew you had served?
Why ask it
Some veterans describe being treated as either fragile or dangerous, or being asked only about the worst things that happened. Whatever this person names, whether a hiring manager's caution or a stranger's sudden reverence, is the thing to avoid doing to them yourself.
What was your service like for the people at home?
Why ask it
Parents, partners and children live through the moves, the missed birthdays and the months of running a household alone, and a veteran may have thought about this more than about anything that happened in uniform. If a spouse or a grown child is in the room, put the same question to them and let the two accounts differ.
How long was it before you talked about your service with anyone outside it?
Why ask it
For some it was the first week and for others it was decades, and the answer tells you how much weight this conversation carries. If it turns out you are among the first to ask, slow down and let them set the limits.
What do you miss about it?
Why ask it
People often name a clear sense of purpose, being good at something, or the company. If they say they miss nothing, take it at face value and do not press: it may have to do with how their service ended, and that is theirs to raise.
What do you not miss at all?
Why ask it
This one usually gets a laugh and a specific complaint: a uniform inspection, a duty roster, a particular officer. It balances the question before it and keeps the conversation from turning solemn.
Did you join a veterans' group or go to reunions, and why or why not?
Why ask it
Some people find their closest friends there, and others stay away for forty years and then turn up to one reunion. The reason matters more than the yes or no, and it is not an opening to suggest that they ought to join something.
Looking back
What is the most important lesson the service taught you?
Why ask it
A regular on school assignment sheets, and it gets a stock reply about discipline or teamwork unless you ask for the day they learned it. The lesson that arrives with a story attached is the one to write down.
What does having served your country mean to you?
Why ask it
Give this one time, because it asks for a belief where most of the list asks for memories. Duty, a debt repaid, a job done well and mixed feelings are all possible answers, and a student should record the veteran's own words and not a summary of them.
What do films and television get wrong about your branch?
Why ask it
An easy way into serious material, since correcting a portrayal is less exposing than describing an experience. Expect complaints about hierarchy, procedure and how quickly things are shown to happen.
What do you wish civilians understood about military life?
Why ask it
It suits a classroom visit, because it lets the veteran correct a whole room's assumptions at once without anyone having to voice them. If the answer stays general, ask for the last time a well-meaning person got it wrong in front of them.
When the war you served in comes up in a classroom or on the news, what do you think gets left out?
Why ask it
This invites a war veteran to correct the record from their own corner of it, which is a different thing from asking whether the war was right. If they turn to the politics themselves, listen and keep your own view out of it.
How do you feel when someone says thank you for your service?
Why ask it
Reactions vary from genuine appreciation to discomfort to irritation, and there is no consensus among veterans. Asking rather than assuming tells you what this particular person wants from strangers.
What does Veterans Day mean to you, and how do you spend it?
Why ask it
Some go to the parade, some meet old friends for breakfast and some would rather the day passed quietly. In the United States it honours everyone who served, while Memorial Day is for those who died, and many veterans notice when the two are confused. Elsewhere, use the name of the day they mark, such as Remembrance Day or Anzac Day.
What is the best way for people to support veterans?
Why ask it
Students ask this hoping for a project, and the reply is frequently modest: hire one, listen to one, visit the older ones who live alone. If they name an organisation, write it down exactly, and remember that one veteran's answer does not speak for all of them.
Is there someone from your service you would like people to remember, and what were they like?
Why ask it
The question asks about the person and leaves it to the veteran whether to say what became of them. Follow with what made that person laugh or what they were good at, and if you are recording, check the spelling of the name.
What are you proudest of from those years?
Why ask it
It is often not a decoration. People name a crew that all came home, a young recruit they trained, a job done properly when nobody was checking, and the answer shows what they think the work was for.
What did the service give you, and what did it cost you?
Why ask it
Asking for both halves at once lets someone give an honest account instead of the grateful one or the bitter one. Many will name the two in a single breath, and your part is to take both down without tidying them into a conclusion.
Would you do it again, knowing what you know now?
Why ask it
A quick yes, a quick no and a long pause are all real answers, and the pause is usually the most interesting. Ask what they would do differently the second time, and do not argue with whichever answer you get.
What advice would you give a young person who is thinking about joining?
Why ask it
Few veterans answer with a flat yes or no, so listen for what they would want a grandchild to have settled before signing anything. Ask it even when nobody in the room plans to enlist, since the advice shows how they weigh their own years.
Have you been back to anywhere you served, or would you want to go?
Why ask it
Returning in later life to a base, a port or a town abroad means a great deal to some veterans, and others have no wish to see any of it again. Ask what they would hope to find still standing, and if the idea appeals to them, it is a trip a family can offer to make together.
Do you still have photographs, letters or anything else from that time?
Why ask it
Ask to see them, because a box of photographs will bring back names and places that no question can. Write down who is in each picture on a separate sheet as they tell you, since that knowledge usually sits with one person and is not recorded anywhere.
How often do you think about those years now?
Why ask it
Every day, once a year on an anniversary and hardly ever are all honest answers, and each tells you how much room the service takes up in the life they have now. It also brings a long conversation back to the present, which is a kinder place to leave it than the middle of a hard story.
What would you want the young people in your family to know about that time in your life?
Why ask it
This turns the conversation from what happened to what should be passed on, and a veteran who has said little for an hour may answer this one directly. A student can ask it as what someone their own age should know. If the reply is that there is nothing to tell, accept it and ask about a person they admired instead.
Is there anything I have not asked that you would like to talk about?
Why ask it
Save it for the very end and then wait, because the pause that follows is sometimes where a story they have been deciding whether to tell comes out. If they say no, thank them and finish there.
Talking with a veteran
Practical guidance for the conversation itself
Before you start
Ask whether they want to talk about it at all
A short question, whether they mind talking about their service, costs nothing and prevents a lot. Some people are glad to; some have spent decades not doing so, and a polite decline should end the topic rather than start a negotiation.
Do not assume deployment or combat
Many veterans never deployed, and many who did never saw combat. Assuming otherwise puts them in the position of correcting you, which is a poor start.
Do not assume injury or illness either
Being treated as damaged is a complaint many veterans make. Let them raise an injury or an illness if it is part of their story, and do not go looking for one.
Ask about the work first
The trade, the training, the equipment and the people are where nearly everyone can talk freely. Starting there earns the standing to hear harder things later, if they want to say them.
Pick a few, not the whole list
Nobody wants to be worked through a questionnaire. Choose a handful you are honestly curious about, start with the group marked Start here, and let their answers decide where you go next. One question followed well is worth more than ten asked in a row.
Which questions for which conversation
- A school assignment or a short interview: the Start here group, asked in order, is a complete set of ten. Add one from Looking back if there is time.
- A parent or grandparent: Joining up and Daily life are where the stories a family has never heard tend to be. Bring any photographs you can find and ask who is in them.
- An oral history: the groups run in the order of a life, from before service to how it looks now, so work through them over more than one sitting. The work is the group to slow down in, because it holds the detail that is hardest to find written down.
- A war veteran: the questions that mention a war ask about the decision to join, the orders, the letters home and the day it ended, and none asks what they saw or did in the fighting. That part is theirs to bring up.
- A veteran you have only just met: two or three from Start here are plenty. Leave Coming home and Looking back until they take the conversation there themselves.
- An older veteran who tires easily: ask one concrete thing at a time, such as a place, a meal, a song or a nickname, and stop while they are still enjoying it.
- A Veterans Day event or classroom visit: agree the questions with the veteran beforehand, and tell younger children plainly which ones are off the table.
Questions to leave alone
- Whether they killed anyone. Many veterans say they are asked this often, and very few want to answer it.
- Anything framed as asking for a war story for your benefit.
- Whether they have PTSD, or any variation on it.
- Political questions about the war they served in, unless they open the subject.
- Comparisons with another veteran you know, or with a film. Asking what films get wrong is different, because it lets them do the correcting.
- Details of classified work, which they cannot discuss and should not have to explain declining.
During the conversation
- 1Let silences run. Considered answers about difficult periods take longer to arrive than social conversation allows for.
- 2Follow their language. If they say the service, or the Corps, or downrange, use their words rather than translating.
- 3Ask about people and places rather than events when a topic gets heavy; it keeps the conversation going without pressing.
- 4Do not fill a pause with your own view of the war or the policy behind it.
- 5If they stop, stop. Changing subject cleanly is more respectful than reassuring them that they can continue.
- 6Thank them for the conversation rather than for their service, if you are unsure how the latter will land.
If you are recording an oral history
- Ask permission for the recording separately from permission for the conversation, and say who will hear it.
- Agree in advance that anything can be struck from the record afterwards, and honour that without argument.
- Get names, dates, units and place names spelled out, since these are the details that make a record useful later and the hardest to reconstruct.
- Keep sessions short and stop while there is still energy in the room. A second sitting usually gets more than a long first one.
- Send them a copy. Many veterans have never heard their own account back, and families value it.
If the conversation turns difficult
- Distress in the room does not require you to fix anything. Staying calm, staying present and stopping the questions is usually enough.
- Do not offer advice about treatment or benefits unless asked.
- In the United States, the Veterans Crisis Line can be reached by dialing 988 and pressing 1, and it is open to veterans and to the people who support them. In another country, look up the veterans' helpline there before a conversation you expect to be hard.
- Follow up a day or two later with a short ordinary message rather than a check-in on their wellbeing.
- If you were told something in confidence, keep it, including from other family members.