Rick Springfield Tells Joe Rogan He Killed a Man While Touring Vietnam With the Troops

Rick Springfield has spent decades in the spotlight as a rock star and an actor, but this week he shared something from his past that he’s never talked about publicly. On the“Joe Rogan Experience”podcast released Tuesday, September 8, Springfield said he killed a man while in Vietnam around 1968 and 1969, when he toured the country performing for the troops.

The 77-year-old musician spent about four months in Vietnam during the war. He told Rogan about a night when he stayed with soldiers and, during an attack, threw mortars down a tube in a radio shack after the men around him urged him to do it. The next day, he learned he had killed someone.“That’s really kind of the one thing I brought back with me that I couldn’t really find a place for that to land,”he said.

Springfield’s story is a heavy one, and it raises a bigger question about all the young entertainers who traveled into combat zones to boost morale, then came home with experiences nobody helped them process. If you have a veteran in your family or your circle, this might be a good time to check in on them and hear their story.

What’s a story from an older family member that changed how you see them? Let us know in the comments.