I know we have a few oldtimers here that were spec ops during the Nam era. Wondering what ever happened to a NCO that I knew back in 1973-74. He was a Staff Sgt at the time. Name is William Barnett(aka Pappy/Wild Bill). He was Special Forces. He was my Field First during AIT at C Co 3/60th, 9th ID in 1973. Became the 4 duece mortar platoon Sgt at CSC 3/60th, 9th ID latter part of 73 when I was in the Redeye section in same unit. I firmly believe he was mentioned in the book: The Quiet Professional. Heard that he attained the rank of Command SgtMg. Dude was a crazy MFer and I would have followed him in to hell.

In this day and age of identity theft and scammers I'd be careful about just how much information you decide to share about him on a public forum... but if you know his birth date, an address or hometown or high school, and if you happen to know if he attends a church or know what sorts of career(s) or activities he was involved with, you have a decent shot of chasing him down.

One of the problems you'll run into is that your friend has a fairly common name so a lot of search results will pop up. Just spending 10 minutes I found several results for that name. None of the few I looked at listed a military background, although one that recently passed away did have a security clearance listed.

Good luck finding your friend!