VETERANS

Veterans Day, Veteran’s Day...
I was thanked by many of our acquaintances for “my” service.  24 years of active Army duty.  Including a year (only one) in the combat zone known as Viet Nam.  I think about our veterans today, who have had multiple combat tours, but it seems are treated with more apathy than I was all those years ago.  Granted, the attention we got was often very negative; but at least there was awareness.  

Today’s war on terror seems to be taken for granted to those who do not serve.  After all, “they” volunteered for the service (!)   More of our soldiers survive the horrors of war only to be plagued by flashbacks, inability to reconcile the inconsistencies, and failing to reintegrate in a   society, which has mostly forgotten their sacrifice which provides for our security...

President Reagan said in his Veteran’s Day address in 1985:

“It is, in a way, an odd thing to honor those who died in defense of our country, in defense of us, in wars far away. The imagination plays a trick. We see these soldiers in our mind as old and wise. We see them as something like the Founding Fathers, grave and gray haired. But most of them were boys when they died, and they gave up two lives -- the one they were living and the one they would have lived. When they died, they gave up their chance to be husbands and fathers and grandfathers. They gave up their chance to be revered old men. They gave up everything for our country, for us. And all we can do is remember... ...And (we) the living have a responsibility to remember the conditions that led to the wars in which our heroes died. Perhaps we can start by remembering this: that all of those who died for us and our country were, in one way or another, victims of a peace process that failed; victims of a decision to forget certain things; to forget, for instance, that the surest way to keep a peace going is to stay strong... ...We're surrounded today by the dead of our wars. We owe them a debt we can never repay. All we can do is remember them and what they did and why they had to be brave for us. All we can do is try to see that other young men never have to join them. Today, as never before, we must pledge to remember the things that will continue the peace. Today, as never before, we must pray for God's help in broadening and deepening the peace we enjoy. Let us pray for freedom and justice and a more stable world. ”  

He shared many other words of wisdom and encouragement for us as people of the greatest nation on earth.  We would do well to remember our source of peace.