Ronald Lawrence Kovic (born July 4, 1946)[1] is an American anti-war activist, author, and United States Marine Corps sergeant who was wounded and paralyzed in the Vietnam War.

[4] Eli Thomas Kovic met Lamb while serving in the Navy during the Second World War after both enlisted shortly after the 1941 attack on Pearl Harbor.

Deserted by most of his unit,[10] he was shot first in the right foot, which tore out the back of his heel, then again through the right shoulder, suffering a collapsed lung and a spinal cord injury that left him paralyzed from the chest down.

As a result of his service and injuries in the conflict, Kovic was awarded the Bronze Star with Combat "V" for heroism in battle and the Purple Heart.

He refused to leave the office of the draft board, explaining to a representative that, by sending young men to Vietnam, they were inadvertently "condemning them to their death", or to be wounded and maimed like himself in a war that he had come to believe was "immoral and made no sense".

[8] In 1974, Kovic led a group of disabled Vietnam War veterans in wheelchairs on a 17-day hunger strike inside the Los Angeles office of Senator Alan Cranston.

In late August 1974, Kovic traveled to Belfast, Northern Ireland, where he spent a week in the Catholic stronghold of "Turf Lodge", interviewing both political activists and residents.

In the spring of 1975, Kovic, author Richard Boyle, and photo journalist Loretta Smith traveled to cover the Cambodian Civil War for Pacific News Service.

[8] On the night of July 15, 1976, at the Democratic National Convention at Madison Square Garden in New York City, Kovic spoke from the podium seconding the nomination of draft resister Fritz Efaw for Vice President of the United States.

The following day, he led a march of several hundred thousand demonstrators on Trafalgar Square, where a huge rally was held to protest the visit of George W. Bush and the war in Iraq.

On Sunday, August 24, 2008, the day before the convention began, Kovic spoke, then led thousands in a march against the war which ended with him saying, "In the city of Denver, we got welcomed home.