This Memorial Day is particularly difficult for me to find words to express the sadness I feel that we ever send young men to war. My own Marine son has spent a combined nine months in a VA hospital since being honorably discharged in 2006. He is doing pretty well at the moment even though the VA owes thousands in back disability pay and he could sure use the money to pay off some traffic fines and buy dog food for his canine therapist, Cooper.
Fighting the system after fighting a war is a cruel irony for those warriors who do come home alive. We cannot do enough for those men and women struggling to regain their balance after life in a combat zone. Below is a tribute created by the 2nd Battalion 5th Marines to honor their comrades who lost their lives in Ramadi in 2004 and 2005. Nothing I can say would be as meaningful.
May peace be upon you.
Many prayers for his continued safety and for his fellow warriors.
I stand corrected. My son is a career soldier. Thanks for pointing out my oversight.
Not to sound self serving but I would say the families of service members have earned their right to speak. Military families pay a huge price for the willing choices their loved ones make.
During John’s deployment I received Google alerts about every dead or wounded Marine in Ramadi and sometimes spent hours heaving over the toilet until I knew it wasn’t my child only to have that relief replaced by the knowledge it was some other Marine mom who paid the price I was spared that day.
In the end, though, I know nothing compares to the horrors experienced by those willing give their life believing they are fighting for you and for me.
If I had my way, the only pro war or anti war comments that ever make sense are from those brave men and women who serve their time. The rest of the population has the right, they just have yet to earn it.
@themguys yes this is John’s unit, he is in a couple of the video clips.
Funny thing is, Tillman criticized the war too. He was a smart guy, even read Noam Chomsky and he became very critical of the decision to invade Iraq and the handling of Afghanistan
Then they can come back home alive and be arrested and body-slammed for dancing at the Jefferson Memorial in DC, on Memorial Day Weekend.
They should have stayed under the bridge and out of site?
Once a year we wave flags in their honor, and have a day off work, yippee.
And we continue to create more of them, every damn day.
I sparred this weekend with another poster regarding Kokesh and Pat Tillman. Other poster declared Pat Tillman was a hero, while Kokesh, because he came back and “criticized”, he is a traitor and deserved all he got in DC. Imagine, this from a flag-waving, respectful amarakan criticizing me for criticizing our military actions overseas. So you evidently are only a hero if you’re dead or praise what you did there. We have become a very ugly nation.
I’m still too mad about the exchange and the attitude to even make sense. I just do not understand the amarakan psyche anymore.
Another chicken hawk, and my patience is very thin with them this time of year.
M, is this Johns’ unit?
My brother, a former Marine aviator – VMA 214 and VMA 233 – sent this from Dubai this morning. It may be of interest. http://www.militarytimes.com/valor/.
For a person referred to as the iceman behind my back, I’m getting maudlin in my old age. My best friend Cooper and I were watching the Memorial Day program from DC last night and I could not stop the tears. Memories long ago intentionally forgotten kept returning. You are correct, I and other corpsmen like me have seen enough guts for several lifetimes. May the military in Afghanastan, Iraq, Korea, and many places where the American public does not realize they are serving, soon come home.